THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
BT THE SAME AUTHOR
JOHN MITCHEL I AN APPRECIATION, WITH
SOME ACCOUNT OF YOUNG IRELAND
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE
NATION
A SURVEY OF IRISH HISTORY
FROM THE ENGLISH INVASION
THE FIRST PHASE : THE
OVERTHROW OF THE CLANS
BY P. S. O'HEGARTY
i f
MAUNSEL & COMPANY, LIMITED
DUBLIN AND LONDON. 1918
J>A
733
628043
Printed by George Roberts, Dublin-
FOR
SEAN OG
WHEN HE GROWS UP
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION x
I THE INVASION (1169-1172) I
II THE RESULTS OF THE INVASION (1172-1315) 12
III THE CHURCH AFTER THE INVASION ig
IV THE FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERACY (1315-
I3l8) 24
V THE GREAT ASSIMILATION — FAUGHART TO
THE STATUTE OF KILKENNY (1318-1367) 30
VI THE GREAT ASSIMILATION — ART MOR MAC
MURCHADHA (1377-1417) 39
VII THE GREAT ASSIMILATION — ART MOR TO
SILKEN THOMAS (1417-1534) 46
VIII THE GERALDINES — SILKEN THOMAS (1534) 50
IX HENRY VIII — REFORMATION HARRY (1534-41) 56
X „ —"KING " HARRY (1541) 62
xi SHANE O'NEILL — TO THE CRUSHING OF
THE SUSSEX-O'DONNELL CONFEDERACY
(1551-1561) 68
xii SHANE O'NEILL — THE VISIT TO ELIZABETH
AND THE TREATY OF BEINN BORB (1562-3) 77
xni SHANE O'NEILL — THE ATTEMPTED CONSOLI-
DATION OF ULSTER (1564-1567) 86
XIV JAMES FITZMAURICE AND THE SECOND
GERALDINE LEAGUE (1567-1579) 97
XV THE LAST EARL OF DESMOND (1579-1583) IO6
XVI THE POLICY OF ELIZABETH 113
XVII THE PLANTATIONS OF CATHOLIC MARY AND
REFORMATION ELIZABETH (1556-1583) Il8
XVIII THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — THE MAKING OF HUGH O'NEILL
(1574-1593) 125
vii
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
XIX THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — THE MAKING OF HUGH O'DON-
NELL (1587-1591) I33
XX THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — THE EVE 143
XXI THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — CLONTIBRETAND DROM FLIUCH
AND THE YELLOW FORD (1595-1598) 150
XXII THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — THE RISING TIDE (1598) 157
XXIII THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — OWNY MAC RORY AND HUGH ROE
STRIKE HOME (1599) I&5
XXIV THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — O'NEILL'S MARCH THROUGH
LEINSTER AND MUNSTER (l6oo) 173
XXV THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — MOUNTJOY AND CAREW AND
DOWCRA (l6oO-l) l8l
XXVI THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — KINSALE (l6oi) 187
XXVII THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES — THE LAST CAMPAIGN (1601-3) 194
XXVIII THE EARL OF TYRONE (1603-1607) 2OI
XXIX THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER (l6lo) 2OJ
XXX THE FIRST WEDGE DRIVEN HOME 215
VI 11
INTRODUCTION
It has been conceded in recent years that there is a
good deal for Irishmen to be proud of in the history of
Ireland before the English invasion, but the same con-
cession has not been made with regard to post-invasion
history. The author believes that it should, and this
book is intended to tell some of the truth with regard
to Irish political history after the invasion. It contains
more of the truth about that than any other book on
the same period in its political aspect.
It is not impartial. Impartiality in Irish history
writing has meant in every case a non-acceptance of
the historic Irish Nation, and the result has been a
political pamphlet rather than a history. Ireland has
been written at rather than about, and the statements
of those whose interest it was to belie her have been
accepted unchecked. But history, if it is to be true
history, must be, like biography, sympathetic towards
its subject, it must accept its subject and not deny it.
There are writers on Irish history who deny that there
is, in any national sense, an Ireland to write about,
whose authorities are the State Paper scribes, and
whose acquaintance with Irish authorities is nil. The
present writer accepts the historic Irish Nation.
The history of Ireland after the invasion is the history
of an arrested development, the history of the struggle
of two civilizations, one materialistic, commercial,
strongly organized for aggression, believing in trade,
ix
INTRODUCTION
and the other spiritual, loosely knit politically, and
believing in liberty. The civilizations of Eastern
Europe were feudal, all save one. The Irish civiliza-
tion was federal, and the whole instinct of the people is
federal rather than feudal. Their civilization was
steeped in the theory of the preservation as fully as
possible of the principle of liberty, liberty for the
individual, for the clan, for the province. The things
which really make a nation, as apart from a State—
language, laws, and customs, traditions, outlook,
literature — all these they had in common, and judged
by these they were more of a nation than England was
at the time of the invasion. Their political system,
however, had not evolved any strong central authority,
and their Ard Ri was so by agreement and not by force,
a symbol of their recognition of their common nation-
ality rather than a king over them. Into a people
which was feeling its way towards a political system
which should adequately unify the country politically,
without doing violence to the race's dominant passion
for the maximum of liberty within the nation, there came
an alien soldiery, feudally trained and feudally led,
with the whole strength of a feudal state behind them,
with a single purpose, pursued consistently and unscru-
pulously. The result was the immediate arrestation
of Irish development. The new force in the country
was wholly alien, not alone in origin, but in everything,
physically and mentally, and it had either to assimilate
it or to root it out before its task of perfecting its
political system could again be taken up. The national
genuius of the Irish was for assimilation rather than
for expulsion, and they did assimilate the alien elements.
INTRODUCTION
But as fast as they did assimilate these, fresh invaders
were sent over, and the wedge which had been driven
into the nation was maintained there until it had totally
disrupted the Irish political system and imposed on
the people a feudal law which they neither understood
nor obeyed, save under duress. When that feudal law
had been established over all Ireland, after four and a
half centuries of fighting, and obedience to it exacted
by force, the Irish were deprived of their land in the
name of law, and then of their arms, and finally of their
legal existence. But still the conquest failed.
In the post-invasion history of Ireland, the landmarks
are three. The Treaty of Mellifont in 1603 marked
the end of the clan civilization, for with the enforced
acceptance by Ulster of English law and suzerainty
the English writ ran for the first time over all Ireland,
and the native civilization was definitely submerged :
the Disarming Act of 1695, when obeyed, marked the
end of the Irish power of military resistance to English
dominance, and opened the way to the attempted con-
quest of the Irish mind, via its degredation by the
operation of the penal laws ; and the foundation of
the Gaelic League'in 1893, marked the reassertion of
Irish civilization, the realization of the people that the
Irish nation must be built on the foundation it was
building on when its development was arrested. The
Union is hardly a landmark in Irish history, save in so
far as it is a landmark in the history of the development
of a colonial nationalism amongst the English planters
in Ireland. It was merely the end of the system of
holding Ireland through a subservient garrison Parlia-
ment, dependant upon England for place and power,
xi
INTRODUCTION
maintained solely in order to register, in the name of
Ireland, England's penal legislation against the Irish
Nation. This book deals with the first of these periods
—the period during which the clan civilization was
overthrown.
The " Savage " school of writers on Irish history have
labelled Ireland as barbarous, with an uncivilised back-
ward people, without law, without cohesion, with some
primal curse upon them which justified an alleged
higher civilization in imposing itself on the island at the
sword's point. All that is untrue. The Irish civiliza-
tion was the highest of Western Europe, the most
advanced in social and spiritual matters ; and the Irish,
instead of being a feeble people, with no cohesion, with
little resisting power, were a strong people, with a
power of resistance, as they have shown, unparalleled.
A comparison with England's resisting power may be
not inopportune in this connexion. Every foreign foe
which has landed in England has conquered it. The
Romans came and remained as conquerors : the Saxons
came as allies and remained as conquerors : the North-
men came and remained as conquerors, and gave
England a Norse dynasty: the Normans came and
remained as conquerors after one battle : and the
Dutch came and remained as conquerors without even
a battle. The Romans never attempted Ireland, but
it was deemed by them an event worthy of signal
mention that on one occasion they defeated an Irish
fleet in the Mediterranean : the Northmen came, but
they gave Ireland no Norse dynasty, they were held
and assimilated, and it was Ireland which, by the battle
of Clontarf in 1014, broke the Northmen's power and
xii
INTRODUCTION
freed Europe from their menace. Finally the English
came, not English then really, but Normans, feudal
lords of exactly the mettle of those who at Hastings
conquered England in one day's fighting. It took four
and a half centuries of constant fighting, and a con-
stant stream of men and money, to overcome the Irish
resistance, and the struggle has never ceased spiritually,
renewing itself physically in every generation. Let no
man say that this was a weak nation, without cohesion.
Look again at the coming of Christianity to the
nations of Western Europe. It was marked every-
where by bloodshed, and also by the beginnings of
organized nations. An organized Christian Church
organized also a nation, and we can trace the beginnings
of France and Germany with the organization of the
Christian framework. But Ireland alone accepted
Christianity without making martyrs, because the Irish
civilization was more spiritual and more advanced than
that of any other civilization of Western Europe. And,
so far from Christianity imposing its organization upon
Ireland, it was Ireland which imposed its organization
upon Christianity. Throughout Europe the Church was
feudal in its organization, in Ireland it had to be federal,
for it found the Irish federal civilization too strong to
accept a Church organized other than federally, and
therefore it was a local Church rather than a compact
one, with no ecclesiastical framework, united, as the
nation itself was united, rather by its common teaching,
common ideals, than by authority or organization. In
Europe, too, the devotional literature which grew up
around Christianity was almost wholly in Latin, but in
Ireland it was almost wholly in the vernacular.
xiii
INTRODUCTION
So that here is a nation, so vital and so assimilating^
that it successfully resisted, and imposed its own forms
upon, the two forces, one physical and one spiritual,
which moulded the other nations of Western Europe.
The nation portrayed by the " Savage " school of writers
could not have done that. Had its development gone
on unchecked it would have evolved a civilization as
different from contemporary civilization as cheese is
from chalk. Its standard of organization would be
co-operation and equal responsibility, not wage slavery,
and its material side would be less thought of than its
spiritual side. It would be a democratic federation,
rather than a centralized state.
This book is intended for the multitude, rather
than for students, and sources and authorities have
not, therefore, been indicated. But every available
source has been used, and no opinion has been taken
secondhand. The State Papers, and the writings
generally of Englishmen in Ireland, have been used
very cautiously. A fact about Ireland, from these
sources, uncorroborated from other sources, is not
worth the paper it is written on, except where it tells
against the writer's policy or conclusions. Where
there is a conflict between English writers and the
Irish annals, the Irish annals have been accepted.
The reader will find somewhat more scanty references
to religious matters than books on Irish history usually
contain. That is because the writer's studies have
convinced him that religion hardly influenced Irish
political happenings to any material extent until the
period of the penal laws.
There has never been in Ireland either a religious
xiv
INTRODUCTION
war or a religious insurrection. The religious motive
has been put forward in insurrections, but that has
been for recruiting purposes — the main motive was
always economic and political, i.e.t land and liberty.
In the spelling of Irish names the writer has been
quite arbitrary. Some of them have been given their
proper Irish spelling, and some which have more or
less established themselves in their mutilated English
versions have not. As a general rule, the spelling of
Irish names in English lettering is militated against by
the fact that nothing is more ugly than, an attempt to
write the Irish language in English lettering.
I owe acknowledgment to my friend H. E. Kenny
for sources and facts with regard to Shane O'Neill, his
own particular subject, and for many other things, the
fruits of the arguments of old days, without which this
book would be the poorer.
xv
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
CHAPTER I
THE INVASION (1169-1172)
Take a map of Ireland and look at it carefully. It
will be observed that there is no central mountain range,
that the greater portion of the interior is a plain, that
the land rises towards the sea, the mountain ranges
being invariably near the coast, and that there is an
abundance of good harbours. It is therefore an easy
country to invade, and a difficult country to hold. For
an invading force was stopped on most seaboards by
the mountains, difficult of passage in many places, and
in all places offering security for the Irish to cut up an
invading army. Any army penetrating into the interior
was cut away from its bases, and in front of it it had
forests and bogs, the paths through which were known
only to the Irish. Behind it the Irish, if they were wise,
closed in and, when it had got far enough, came down
on it from the front and the rear, the right and the left,
and there was an end of it unless it could succeed in
righting its way back. The Irish, of course, were not
all wise, and they were not always wise; but if they
were not wise enough to play the proper game always,
there were enough of them wise to effectually prevent,
for many centuries, any effective occupation of the
island by the English. There was no position in the
island which could be said to be its military key, and
the only way to hold it effectively was to conquer and
police every inch of it. But to this which is true as a
general fact there is one exception, a very notable
exception, which Shane O'Neill Mor was the first to
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
discern — and that is Dublin. Dublin is situated roughly
half-way up the east coast, in the gap which there occurs
in the mountains. It opens directly on the great central
plain, and from its position an army can be directed
with equal facility south or west over comparatively level
country. And any foreigner planted there could, as will
be seen, by planting a few forts across towards the west,
drive a wedge into Ireland, and, with the facility of
making an incursion in any direction, fatally react upon
any attempted union of north and south. On the one
side is open to the sea and, with a foreign garrison, it is
an open door into the country. On the other side it
opens into the heart of the country; and its possession
meant the power to strike in any direction at a moment's
notice. This strategic importance of Dublin will crop
up again and again, and it was the English grasp of its
importance which kept them their grip on the country
at all. For more than a century, the English Pale was
practically confined to Dublin, and paid tribute to the
surrounding Irish chiefs; but while the English held
Dublin Ireland was never safe. The colonists in other
parts of Ireland — in Cork, and Galway, and Ulster —
turned Irish by dint of their environment; but Dublin,
the open sore through which all evil came into the
country, looking always towards the east, Dublin kept
foreign through the centuries. For a great portion of the
period during which Ireland is generally supposed to have
been conquered, England held just Dublin and perhaps
twenty or thirty miles in circumference around it; the
rest of the country was to all intents and purposes
independent, but with its political organization disrupted
by the English wedge.
Again, let it be recollected that there was in Ireland
no centralized power which could either be struck at, or
could strike, in the name of the nation, and a defeat of
the Ard Ri, or of a provincial king, or of all the pro-
vincial kings, did not mean a defeat of the nation in the
sense in which such a defeat operated elsewhere. For
THE INVASION
the clan system and the communal land tenure, which
retarded the formation of an effective political union,
were the chief inspiration of the piecemeal resistance
W7hich was set up to the English invasion. Each clan
had to be conquered separately, and the fortunes of the
nation were never dependent upon one man or one tribe.
In England, when William the Conqueror conquered
Harold at Hastings, he conquered also the whole nation,
the political strength of which was centralized under
Harold. In Ireland, when Henry had outmanoeuvred
Roderic O'Connor he had still to reckon with O'Brien
and McCarthy, O'Neill and O'Donnell, and the chiefs
of every clan in the country.
The story which attributes the English invasion to
Diarmuid Mac Murchadha and the wife of O'Rourke is
largely fiction, so far as the lady is concerned, that
invasion having been inevitable in any case. From the
beginning of his reign Henry had cast covetous eyes
upon Ireland, and in 1155 he obtained from Nicholas
Breakspear, who had become Pope under the title of
Adrian IV, a Papal Bull authorizing him to conquer
and hold Ireland. The authenticity of that Bull has
been questioned without success; but the question now
is purely an academic one. It was promulgated by
Henry and accepted as genuine, it was never repudiated
by any of the Popes, and it was confirmed by Pope
Alexander II in 1172, and by Pope John in 1315.
Although Henry got this Bull in 1155, he was unable,
owing to his French wars and his conflicts with his
children, to make any move in the direction of Ireland,
until appealed to for help by Diarmuid in 1168.
Diarmuid in 1152 had carried off Dervorgilla, the wife
of O'Rourke of Breffny, with the lady's own consent.
As she was then forty-four years old and Diarmuid sixty-
two, it is difficult to believe that there was any romantic
side to this episode, but anyway Tudough O'Connor
interfered at the solicitation of O'Rourke, led an army
into Leinster, and restored Dervorgilla to her husband.
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
She did not, however, again live with him. Fourteen
years afterwards Diarmuid, who was proud, cruel and
tyrannical to his own people, was expelled by them from
his kingdom, O'Rourke being one of the instigators of
this expulsion: but the expulsion was wholly because
of his tyranny and unpopularity, the Leinstermen exer-
cising their undoubted right of expelling a bad king.
Diarmuid sought help of Henry II, but Henry, being in
France, could give him no active help. The oppor-
tunity was too good to be lost, however ; and, moved
hy Diarmuid's importunities, he gave him letters
authorizing any of his English subjects to come to
Diarmuid's assistance. Armed with these letters
Diarmuid set out for England, where he soon found
adventurers to back him.
These first English invaders of Ireland were of the
very same stamp as those who come even in our own
time. Through the generations the supply has kept
steadily on, and the quality has never varied — adven-
turers, men with fortunes to make or mend, with
everything to gain outside their own country, and
nothing to lose but life, and to keep that they fought hard
and dealt mercilessly. They had the one great quality
of their times — they were brave ; and the other qualities
of their prototypes in all ages — they were unscrupulous,
desperate and liars, shameless on points of honour, and
keeping faith only at the sword's point. Diarmuid's
new allies had been trained on the Welsh border, where
they were encouraged to acts of conquest against the
Welsh — things like the historic Jameson Raid against
the South African Republic — and any land they won
they held by feudal law from the English Crown, thus
giving the said Crown an excuse for grabbing Wales
under the pretence of protecting its subjects. And in
Ireland the process, as we shall see, was similar at
bottom.
The chief of the adventurers were Fitzstephen, De
Prendergast, Fitzgerald, Montmaurice, De Cogan,
THE INVASION
Le Gros, and Strongbovv, the latter being the most
considerable of them, and to him Diarmuid promised
his daughter Eva in marriage, and the kingdom of
Leinster after his death. So far as Leinster was con-
cerned it was, of course, a wholly illegal promise.
Diarmuid had no more right to give away Leinster
than he had to give away the moon ; but Strongbow
knew nothing of Irish law, and possibly thought
Diarmuid had held Leinster by feudal law. In any
case, he would not have troubled himself much on a
mere question of right. I do not propose to go into
detail, into battles and sieges, but to indicate the
general march of events, and the evolution of the forces
which moulded them in Ireland ; and for a proper
consideration of Irish history it is necessary to define
and bear in mind the following forces or combinations,
around which Irish history turns : —
(1) The Irish People.
(2) The Church.
(3) The English in Ireland.
(4) The English Crown.
(i) The people did not view the invasion with
equanimity, but the fighting against it was at first
confined to those chiefs whose territory was attacked
or threatened, and Roderic O'Connor proved unequal,
as Ard-Ri, to the occasion. Strongbow and his people
were looked upon merely as allies of Diarmuid, and it
was not the first time that an expelled prince had
sought, by the aid of foreign mercenaries, to recover
his kingdom. The English, a foreign force, suddenly
intruded into the country, and supported from outside,
and kept foreign by a powerful kingdom, set back the
political unity which was forming, and the Irish nation
found itself compelled either to assimilate or expel a
body which was mechanically more highly organized
than itself, and which had different conceptions of
social and political organization.
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
(2) The policy of the Church was constant, and con-
sistently against the Irish. All the influence which
could be exercised from Rome was exercised in the
direction of securing the English in Ireland, and of
bringing the Irish Church into line with the Catholic
Church generally ; and the Church at home accepted
the English dominion as a means of increasing its own
independence of the mass of the laity.
(3) The English garrison was out for spoil and
plunder always. It fell into two divisions — those who,
sprung from English stock, became practically Irish
by temperament and inclination, three-quarters assimi-
lated, yet held by the political connection with England
as a safeguard for their retention of their property and
power ; and those who came over, each generation, fresh
from England, whose business was to make a fortune
in as short a time as possible, and who confiscated the
property of the Anglo-Irish as cheerfully as that of the
old Irish.
(4) The policy of the English Crown was also con-
stant. It was to keep England's grip upon Ireland,
and to prevent the organization there either of an Irish
or an Anglo-Irish party which would be strong enough
to defy it. It set clan against clan, and it set the
Anglo-Irish against both. It wanted only weak chiefs,
weak nobles, dependent upon the Crown, in the country;
and it relentlessly pursued every strong man of every
party. For many centuries it could not undertake a
conquest of Ireland, but what it could do to keep the
dagger of invasion in the country that it did — murder-
ing, robbing, lying, flattering now the Irish, now the
Anglo-Irish, now the newer adventurers, only to come
in at the end and trample them all under its iron heel.
There is a common impression that the invaders
conquered half the country in two or three battles.
That is quite an erroneous supposition ; they had to
fight every mile of their marches in this invasion, but
they had to fight a people who fought in saffron shirts
THE INVASION
and disdained armour as cowardly. The English, be
it recollected, were completely armed, and fought on
horseback with sword and lance, suppprted by archers
with the deadly crossbow. The Irish fought in shirts,
with sword, and spear, and javelin, and battleaxe, and
before they had got used to the new warfare the English
had got a footing in the country.
Diarmuid, after his arrangements with Strongbow
and the others, returned to Ireland in the winter of
1168, and remained in hiding near Ferns, waiting for
the arrival of his allies. The first of them, Fitzstephen,
came in May 1169, followed almost immediately by
De Prendergast, with about seven hundred men in all.
Diarmuid and his followers immediatedly joined them,
and they marched on Wexford, which was then
Hiberno-Danish. They were beaten twice in their
assaults on the town ; but then, unluckily, the clergy
in the town, beginning the shibboleth about " prevent-
ing further bloodshed" in Ireland, induced the
townspeople to parley with the invaders, the result of
which was that they accepted Diarmuid's overlordship
and joined his forces. He then made an incursion into
Ossory, against the chief of which he had an especial
grudge. It was the first English experience of Irish
warfare, and it was typical of many. The Ossory men
retreated, throwing up entrenchments here and there,
and worrying the English, until they had them far
enough, when they turned and, attacking them on all
sides, forced them back. Fitzstephen, however, played
a similar game, retreated also, and then, suddenly
turning, his heavily-armoured knights turned the
battle and scattered the Ossory men. The result of
a week's hard fighting was that Ossory was laid waste,
and Diarmuid returned to Ferns, the Irish closing
up again and occupying the wasted territory. These
proceedings had attracted Roderic O'Connor's
attention, and he gathered the forces of Connacht
and Meath, and marched against Diarmuid ; but
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
instead of crushing him while he was able, he parleyed,
and finally made a treaty by which Diarmuid was to
be recognized a,s King of Leinster, was to send the
English back, and not to bring any more of them
over. Thereupon Roderick marched back, and
Diarmuid continued organizing. Maurice Fitzgerald
and Raymond Le Gros came over with detachments,
and finally Strongbow himself landed with close on
2,000 men in August 1170. The combined armies
marched on Waterford, which was taken at the third
assault, and no quarter given. Amidst the ruin and
carnage the marriage of Strongbow and Eva was
celebrated, and the spoilers marched on Dublin with
an army of 5,000 English and perhaps 10,000 Irish.
The Dublin men had no force to resist this, and they
met the invaders at a parley outside the walls ; but
Milo de Cogan and Le Gros were above parleys, broke
into the city while the truce was on, and were soon
followed by the whole army. Hasculf, the Danish
King of Dublin, escaped by sea ; Roderic, who had got
as far as Clondalkin, in a march to defend Dublin,
turned back to Connacht for winter quarters, and the
enemy were left in undisputed possession of Wexford,
Waterford and Dublin — that is to say, practically in
possession of the south-eastern coast.
In the meantime the English Crown came into play.
Diarmuid died towards the end of 1170, and Strongbow
claimed Leinster by virtue of his compact and his
marriage with Eva. Tidings of this reached Henry,
and he issued a mandate condemning Strongbow's pro-
ceedings, ordered that no English ship should carry
anything to Ireland, and ordered all English subjects
in that country to return to England by next Easter.
It did not suit Henry that Strongbow should grow so
strong in Ireland as to be able to maintain himself
independent of him, and the object of this move was to
compel him to do feudal homage for Leinster. And
while Strongbow debated what he should do, Roderic
8
THE INVASION
O'Connor, with an army of 30,000 invested Dublin,
while the Manx, as allies of the Irish, blockaded Dublin
by sea. His position soon became desperate, and he
offered, if Roderic would raise the siege, to become his
vassal and hold Leinster from him. This Roderic
refused, telling him that if the English had not evacuated
Dublin by a certain date he should carry it by assault.
The sequel is painful telling. The Irish were little
accustomed to sieges, and probably Roderic's operations
consisted merely of surrounding Dublin and waiting ;
but anyway when, in sheer desperation, Strongbow
sallied out he found the Irish without a watch, without
any suspicion of attack, and routed the whole army,
Roderic himself barely escaping with his life.
Strongbow now, feeling himself unable to hold
Leinster without English help, went to England to
Henry and laid his conquests at his feet, declaring that
he acted only in his name, and would deliver over
Leinster to him. This was precisely what Henry wanted,
so Strongbow was "graciously pardoned," and his
English estates were restored to him. Henry himself
equipped an army and landed in Waterford in October
1171, with about 5,000 men, and the occurrences during
this visit are somewhat uncertain. English writers
maintain that he received the submission of all the Irish
chiefs, including Roderic O'Connor himself. The
Annals of the Four Masters, on the other hand, simply
record that he came and went, and do not record any
submissions; though the Annals of Ulster and Loch Cet
in entries which agree almost word for word, say that
he "received the hostages" of Munster and Leinster
and Meath. What seems to have happened is that none
of the chiefs were able individually to resist Henry's
force, plus Strongbow's, that Roderic's defeat just pre-
viously put him out of the way of making another appeal
for a general hosting, and that the chiefs gave hostages,
as they were accustomed to do, to the strongest of
themselves. But this was nothing like a submission in
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
the sense in which the English construe it; it was more
of a recognition that he had the strongest army than
anything else, and in effect meant nothing in the way
of general submission. And we know that after his
departure the English held just Wexford, Waterford
and Dublin. But whatever doubt may exist as to
Munster and Leinster, Connacht and Ulster held aloof
and ignored Henry's presence altogether. Henry is
said to have contemplated an expedition to the North,
but his excommunication for the murder of Thomas a
Becket called him suddenly to England. In going he
sublimely granted Dublin to the citizens of Bristol,
Leinster to Strongbow, Meath to De Lacy, and Ulster
to De Courcy, thus laying down the headline of English
policy in Ireland, that the Irish had no legal existence.
He made some attempt to justify the Bull which he
had received from Pope Adrian, and called a Synod at
Cashel in 1172, which was presided over by the Papal
Legate, Christian, Bishop of Lismore. The decrees of this
Synod are the strongest proof of the absurdity of the
reason alleged for giving Henry the Bull, for they deal
altogether with minor points, none of them with any
points of doctrine. The only points I wish to notice
are that the Synod accepted Henry as King, decreed
the payment of tithes by "all good Christians," decreed
Church lands and possessions freed from all secular
exactions — tantamount to freedom from taxation in
modern times — and decreed that none of the clergy
should be obliged to contribute anything towards the
eric for a homicide, even if they were kindred to the
perpetrators of the crime. That is to say, they tended
to the betterment of the position of the ecclesiastics,
and it was this and a greater power that they hoped to
find under the government of a feudal monarch like
Henry.
Many of those Henry brought with him, together
with all those whom he found there, remained in Ireland
behind him. Although they held only portion of the
10
THE INVASION
east coast, and that only the length of their lances, they
had been granted three-fourths of the country; and
Strongbow, De Lacy and De Courcy granted portions
of territories they had never seen to their friends and
vassals in the recognized feudal fashion ; so here was
Ireland with a swarm of needy adventurers let loose to
prey upon her, and with the whole power of a well-
organized kingdom behind them. It was the beginning
of a struggle which has not yet ended. The invasion
and "conquest" of Ireland by Strongbow and Henry II
amounted to this — that after three years fighting the
English held Dublin, Waterford and Wexford, and as
much of the neighbouring country as was covered by
the shadow of their lances. The rest of the country
was in Irish hands and unconscious of any national
danger. It was gripped, but it did not know it. Dublin
was gripped, and Waterford and Wexford ; but Ulster
did not feel that grip, nor Connacht, nor Munster.
ii
CHAPTER II
THE RESULTS OF THE INVASION (1169-1315)
War! war! war! all over Ireland! That was the
most conspicuous result of the English invasion.
Some writers on Irish history have taken Henry's
grants with bland ingenuousness, and assumed that the
simple-minded Irish handed over these territories duti-
fully to Henry's nominees. But the history of the
century which succeeded is plain, and shows that in
every settlement of theirs the English had to fight hard
and fight constantly — that even when they had won
any territory they had to fight hard to keep it. That
indeed they did not do for long anywhere, and they
were continually being expelled out of various districts,
only to return again in due course and renew the
conflict.
Immediately after Henry's departure the adventurers
set about the attempt to make themselves masters of
the territories which Henry had granted to them. Had
they gathered their whole forces together, they could
have beaten down by main force any one of the Irish
kings, but possibly they were shrewd enough to discern
that that would inevitably lead to an Irish National
Confederation and their consequent utter rout. At any
rate, they acted individually and, with an adventurous
recklessness and bravery which were their only redeem-
ing features, they set out, each " to conquer his
kingdom." From Dublin, and Waterford, and
Wexford, they pushed out westwards and south-
wards, and they fought the Irish in a way which was
at first strange to them, but the significance of which
they soon understood. Pushing out from Dublin to
the conquest of Meath, De Lacy built castles at Trim
12
RESULTS OF THE INVASION
and Kells, and garrisoned them, holding the district by
means of these garrisons. The Irish, in their mutual
warfare, had not. occupied opponents' territory to any
extent. If O'Neill made a foray into Meath or into
Leinster he took hostages, and cattle, and crops, but
he took no territory. But the English, wherever
they went, built a castle and fortified it and menaced
the surrounding district with it, and for quite a long
time the Irish could find nothing better to do with
these castles than to pull them down. De Lacy, in his
attempt upon Meath, slew Tiernan O'Rourke by
treachery at a friendly conference, and after that found,
to his astonishment, that he was as far from conquer-
ing it as before. It was the difference between the
feudal chief and the tribal chief, also perhaps the
difference between the Irishman and the Englishman.
The course of the struggle in Meath varied : some-
times De Lacy was on top and sometimes O'Rourke
and O'Melaghlin, until De Lacy gradually came to be
a kind of institution in the district, a chief in his way,
like so many of the Irish chiefs, to be reckoned with
in all warlike operations in the district, either on one
side or the other. And much the same thing happened
to the others. Like their predecessors the Northmen,
they had begun their operations on the coastline — De
Bermingham in Louth, De Cogan and Fitzstephen
in Cork, Fitzmaurice in Kerry, FitzAdelm de Burgh in
Connacht, and De Courcy gripped Ulster at Down-
patrick, where he clung like a limpet. Town warfare
was never much to the Irish taste, so the seacoast
towns were left mostly in English hands, and thence
they gradually spread inwards, building castles to
overawe conquered territory, until they began to count
in Ireland as territorial chiefs in the same sense as the
Irish chiefs, and the De Burghs in Connacht, and the
Fitzgeralds in Munster began to loom large in Irish
eyes ; and the annals speak of the " English of
Connacht " and the " English of Munster," and so on.
13
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
I am not going to chronicle the many and bloody
battles which took place, or to record the increase or
decrease of English territory in this period. It was
really as if one took the adventurers and the Irish and
mixed them up together ; there were no big clumps
which could be " coloured red " outside certain of the
towns, and the English everywhere were surrounded
by Irish. They held settlements in a great many
counties, but these wrere just settlements, and did not
amount to any grip on the country, although as the
next century went on their power increased. It cannot
be too often repeated that at this time the Irish had
no sense of a national danger, no sense of an attempt
to make them slaves in their own country ; that the
various English incursions all over Ireland were looked
on as so many settlements in the country, so many new
clans introduced ; and that there was no consciousness
of the external directing force or the external danger
which always threatened while the " English of
Ireland " kept up the bond with England. And as
time went on various of the English leaders — De Lacy,
De Cogan, Fitzstephen, De Burgh, for instance — made
good their footing and came to be accepted as chiefs of
districts inhabited partly by Irish and partly by English,
and the surrounding chiefs found it advantageous
sometimes to form alliances with them instead of
continually fighting them. And so they gradually
rooted themselves in the country, now in alliance with
a neighbouring chief and fighting with him against
somebody else, now fighting him obstinately ; nowr
extending their influence, and now, surprised by a
sudden uprising of the Irish, driven oft into some
neighbouring friendly territory, with all the fighting
to do over again. The Irish used the English precisely
as they had used the Northmen — used them to fight
each other, and in return for their assistance tolerated
them in certain of their territories, made treaties with
them and fought them by turns. But the English
RESULTS OF THE INVASION
with more of a common purpose than the Northmen,
used the Irish with the idea of dominance always in
their minds, with the consciousness always that their
title to Irish territory was an English title, and that
their only security in it was the planting of the English
power in the land. And although they became
assimilated into the Irish nation, by intercourse and
intermarriage, fast enough, yet the English Crown
always saw to it that a fresh supply of adventurers
came over through the open port of Dublin. And so
during the century or so that followed the invasion you
are to see the Irish and English turbulently mixing,
interpenetrating each other, with boundaries and powers
which ever fluctuated.
The tide of battle veered as much to the one side as
to the other. But certain of the Irish kings stand out
prominently with better fighting capacity, and more
consistent opposition to the invaders, than others.
Domhnall O'Brien, King of Thomond, fought them
constantly, beginning by almost annihilating the
English of Leinster under Strongbow himself at the
battle of Thurles in 1174; and during the celebrated
visit of King John of England (then Prince John) in
1185, he defeated his forces with great slaughter.
Finghin MacCarthy of Desmond, was another who
fought gallantly against the English, and utterly
crushed Maurice Fitzgerald and the whole English
forces when that Geraldine was Lord Deputy. And
the O'Connors furnished many gallant defenders of
the fatherland to set against the indecision of Roderic.
Conor Moinmoy, son of Roderic, was the first to
attempt a national confederation against the English.
But he was slain in 1186, and left to his son Cathal
Carrach, and his half-uncle, the better-known Cathal
Crobhdearg, the task of keeping Connacht safe, which
they did through many a bloody conflict. But the
northern kings stand out clearest and noblest. In a
long reign of over thirty years Hugh O'Neill steadily
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
sent back wave after wave of English invasion — the
first of his family singled out for that honourable work.
In recording his death in 1230, the Annals say " aman
who had given neither hostages or tributes to either
English or Irish, who had gained many victories over
the English, and defeated them with great slaughter,
and who had levied tributes on both English and Irish
enemies, and contemplated the conquest of all Ireland,
died, though it was rather expected that he would have
fallen in battle with the English." John De Courcy
at first, and other English Deputies after him, found
both the O'Neills and O'Donnells impassable in any
attempt on the North, and Hugh O'Neill was always
ready, as was O'Brien in Leath Mogha, to help any
other chief against the English. And in the record of
these battles there is constant mention of fleets, the
fleet of O'Neill, and of O'Donnell, and of Cathal
Crobhdearg, and of MacCarthy, though they seem to
have been used mainly for transport.
For more than eighty years after the invasion the
struggle was too fierce, and the violent incursion into
the nation of the foreign element was too recent to
admit of it settling down into any kind of oneness, or to
admit of an attempt at unity. The English Crown
made no attempt to conquer the country in the sense in
which it so many times attempted to conquer Scotland.
It was too busy fighting France to do more than keep
one eye on Ireland and feed the flame of war there.
If any Deputy grew powerful or arrogant he was recalled;
if he was too successful against the Irish he was recalled;
and if he was not successful enough he was recalled. All
that the Deputies were expected to do was to keep the
Irish and the English of Ireland fighting one another,
and any Deputy who attempted a real pacification or
unity of the country was imperilling his neck. So they
kept the game going, and each plundered as much as he
could in the few years before some new and greedy
adventurer told lies about him and had him recalled.
16
RESULTS OF THE INVASION
As their feudal lords, too, the English kings often sum-
moned the Anglo-Irish lords to give feudal service in
the Scotch, Welsh, and French wars, and as they
depended upon English support for their title to Ireland
they had perforce to obey, and when they returned from
the foreign wars they found most of their territory had
become Irish tribeland again. Then they got more help
from England, and the strife began anew. This was
one of the reasons which caused the English power in
this first century to fluctuate so mnch, and which, at
the time of the Wars of the Roses, in which some of
the Anglo-Irish nobles took so prominent a part, almost
destroyed their power altogether. For over eighty years
this kind of thing clouded Ireland's perception of her-
self, sundered her unity, set every chief fighting hard to
keep his own territory, and then, after eighty years,
light came and Hugh O'Connor, son of Felim, son of
Cathal Mor of the Wine-Red Hand, made the first
defiinite stroke for the nation again. This Hugh was
one of the wisest and bravest of the O'Connors. He
had done his best to stop the internal warfare between
his own family on the one hand, and the descendants of
Cathal Carrach on the other; and now he attempted
once again to place a king over all Ireland. He made
a truce with O'Brien of Thomond, and they combined
their forces and marched north to Newry, where they
solemnly invested Brian O'Neill with the crown of
Ireland. The new confederacy was unfortunately
short-lived, for their combined forces were beaten at
Dromdearg near Downpatrick, in 1260, by the English
under Stephen Longsword, Earl of Salisbury, Brian
O'Neill himself being slain, and the confederacy fell to
pieces. But the incident is notable in our history as
the first striving of the national mind to get itself
expressed in political terms after the lesson of the
English invasion began to filter in; and it was followed
by the much clearer attempt of Domhnall O'Neill, of
which more later. Hugh O'Connor, his national govern-
c 17
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
ment thus nipped in the bud, continued through the
rest of his life, until his death in 1274, to hold Connacht
against the English, and he defeated them again and
again, being especially active in destroying their castles —
Athlone, Roscommon, Sligo, for instance, being pulled
down by him many times.
The reader will naturally ask how, if the English were
beaten so many times, they managed to keep their grip
on the country. It is an historical fact that from the
righting point of view we Irish have no reason to hang
our heads when we consider any century of the English
invasion, winning perhaps six battles for every battle
the English won. But it is also an historical fact that
the Irish had no idea of "following up" a battle, and
that the idea of doing so only penetrated into them very
slowly. Time and again they allowed a Deputy, or a
big man like De Courcy or Fitzgerald, to escape almost
unmolested, with the remnants of his army, to the
nearest English castle or town. It was a relict of the
old clan warfare, which was devoid of the principle of
occupancy of conquered territory, so that the defeated
army was seldom pursued after the first flush of the
victory. The contrast between the two righting methods,
and the reason for the strange anomaly that those who
were oftenest beaten managed to hold the country may
be tersely put thus : When the English won a battle
they usually built and fortified a castle; when the Irish
won a battle they usually pulled one down.
18
CHAPTER III
THE CHURCH AFTER THE INVASION
Early Ireland had imposed its organization upon the
Church, and the Church supported Henry in the hope
of finding, under the rule of a strong feudal monarch,
the opportunity to perfect its own organization on the
continental model. But the stubborn Irish again upset
all calculations, and the Church after the invasion was
as helpless and as distracted as were the Irish and
English of Ireland in the political aspect. I have already
referred to the decrees of the Synod which Henry had
caused to be held at Cashel under the presidency of the
Papal Legate, Christian of Lismore. They dealt alto-
gether with minor points and not at all with points of
doctrine. There is not a particle of evidence anywhere
that the statements in Adrian's Bull as to the degra-
dation of the Irish Church had any foundation; and the
decrees of this Synod, dealing as they do with minor
things, are plain proof that the Church was neither lax
nor heretical. If there had been the slightest foundation
in actual fact for Adrian's charges Henry would have
taken good care to have them dealt with by the Synod.
But there was not, and the motive of the Synod in
accepting Henry's claims was to consolidate the Irish
Church.
The result was a rude shock to them, for the advent
of the English, instead of consolidating the Church,
split it up. In one sense — in the sense that it imposed
tithes and exempted Church property from certain
secular exactions, defined eccelesiastical jurisdiction,
and made other changes tending to close up its organiza-
tion— it accomplished some of the desired results; but
19
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
all that was nullified by the fact that it practically split
the Church into two portions, an English interest and an
Irish interest, whose spheres of activity shifted as the
political forces manoeuvred, and as time went on Church
buildings were destroyed, and Church revenues seized,
by both parties; and by the fact that it took away its
autonomy and put it under the English Crown.
The last Irish Archbishop of Dublin prior to the
11 Reformation " was Lorcan O'Toole, who was Arch-
bishop at the invasion. That fact alone illustrates the
effect which the English invasion had upon the Church.
Once Henry's djominion was accepted they could not
proceed with the election of a bishop or archbishop
until Henry had issued his conge d'elire, and Henry
always took his time about that, and in the meantime
confiscated to his own use the revenues of the See.
Then he summoned the Chapter, and used all his
influence to get a prelate elected who was either English
or favourable to the English. Dublin, for instance,
became vacant in 1180, but Henry did not summon the
Chapter until 1181, and then he summoned it for
Evesham, and induced it to select an English monk
named John Comyn. Of the twenty-three Archbishops
of Dublin thence to the Reformation all were English,
and many — Comyn, for instance — were feudal lords as
well as ecclesiastics, and slaughtered and prayed with
equal equanimity. The same game was played with
Armagh, and Cashel, and Lismore, and other Sees,
with varying success, and the introduction of these
English bishops, followed of course by English clergy,
none of them speaking Irish, amounted in effect to a
division of the Church, the two sections hating one
another and never pulling together. And amongst the
religious Orders the same story was enacted. The
English, as a general rule, pulled down Church buildings,
monasteries, etc., in their raids, and scattered the ecclesi-
astics. And then, of course, they condescended to
patronize religion again, only they took care that it
20
THE CHURCH AFTER THE INVASION
should be quite English. So they built monasteries
and filled them with imported religious Orders, between
whom and the Irish members of the same and other
Orders there was deadly war. Irish monks were expelled
from monasteries in English territory, and no Irish
novices were admitted; and the Irish monasteries retali-
ated in kind. And so the Church in Ireland found itself
portion English and portion Irish, and suffering equally
at the hands of both parties when the battle fury was
on them, and the Church, as a Church, never seemed
to have the disposition to fight against it.
If the Irish Church had been a national Church at
the time of the invasion it would not, of course, have
endured this kind of interference for one week. But it
was not national; it welcomed the English Crown, and
it never afterwards cancelled that welcome. The mass
of the lower clergy, indeed, remained Irish enough, and
the monks and friars always deserved well of their
country; but the Church, as a Church, threw in its lot
with England. The two-fold effect which the invasion
had upon it was to take away its autonomy, and to plant
discord in it in precisely the same way as discord was
planted in the Irish body politic. About the Irish Church,
and the extent of its connection with Rome, volumes
have been written and will, I suppose, continue to be
written. Irish history is concerned with these things
only in their political aspect, and any references to the
Church in this book are references to it only in its
influences on Irish history. One thing seems to me to
be clear — that the Church of Patrick was founded as a
national Church, and that in the course of time the
ecclesiastical instinct became segregated and developed
a consciousness of its own which gradually became,
if not antagonistic to the nation, at the least unsympa-
thetic to its political organization. That antagonism
was heightened by the fact that in the centuries immedi-
ately preceding the invasion many of the leaders of the
Irish Church had been smitten with the dignity of the
21
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Imperial Church of Rome, and had striven for a closer
union. In the beginning the consciousness of the Irish
Church towards Rome was a consciousness of equality;
it always respected Rome as the oldest of the Christian
Churches, but it paid it no homage of an Imperial
nature; its relations with it were sisterly (or brotherly
if you will), and it had absolute autonomy inside the
four seas of Ireland. As time went on, as the ecclesias-
tical consciousness grew more ecclesiastical and less
national, as it failed to dominate the Irish social and
political organization, failed to free itself from the bonds
imposed by the clan system, as the two powers — the
lay and the ecclesiastical — developed specific antag-
onisms, it went nearer and nearer to forming an integral
portion of the Imperial Church of the Continent. And
when Henry came it seized upon that chance of consoli-
dating itself on a feudal organization under a strong
feudal king. The price it had to pay was the definite
acceptance of Rome as the supreme and Mother Church,
and the surrender of its autonomy. Up to then it
elected its own bishops and archbishops, thenceforward
that election was subject to the English Crown and to
the Popes. It grasped at the Crown in order to make
itself independent of the nation; and it found itself in
the result independent neither of the nation nor of the
Crown; it found itself between the two, and so com-
mitted that it could not go wholly either with the one
or the other. It found itself compelled to receive into
itself a body of foreigners, to view with smouldering,
but ineffectual anger, the translation to Dublin and
Armagh of unknown English monks, the dawn of an
English party in the Church as opposed to the Irish
majority.
If it had had any national feeling it would have
declared a holy war against the English; if it had had
any dignity it would have at least fought for its
autonomy against the English, as it had fought for its
privileges against the Kings of Tara. But, believing
22
THE CHURCH AFTER THE INVASION
that its own interests lay in the setting up of a strong
kingdom in Ireland on a feudal basis, it stood in with
the invaders, and extinguished itself as a Church. In
the result, it lost its autonomy, endured foreigners, and
saw Ireland gradually accustomed to the idea of
plundering Church property, as well as lay property,
and to the political Church dignitary, who held Church
property and drew Church revenues, and was a Church-
man one day in the week, and very much a man of the
world for the other six days. Like the nation, it was
rent, disordered, plundered.
23
CHAPTER IV
THE FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERACY
(1315-1318)
The reader will hardly recognize in the above title
that episode in Irish history which has been commonly
described as the " Invasion of Edward Bruce," which
is here presented in its true light as the result of the first
notable national confederacy in Ireland, and the first
effective evidence of the working of the national instinct
towards the resumption of its political evolution. In
the century and a half that had elapsed since the
invasion, that Devolution had been arrested by a force
which, numerically, was inferior to that of any one Irish
province, but which persisted because the Irish chiefs
as a whole did not recognize the menace, and made
peace or war with the English just as they did with
each other. But Domhnall O'Neill recognized the
menace, and concluded that, in order to meet it, all
Ireland should combine under one strong king.
According to Irish law he himself would be Ard Ri, but
he recognized that an outside king of kindred blood
would have a better chance of welding Ireland together.
The struggle of Scotland for its independence had been
followed sympathetically in Ireland, especially in Ulster,
and when, after Bannockburn, it was definitely estab-
lished, the Ulster chiefs, at O'Neill's instance, asked
Robert Bruce for help to drive the English out of
Ireland, and offered the crown of Ireland to Edward
Bruce. The offer was accepted, and its result was the
first national' confederacy in Ireland, which crowned
Edward Bruce Ard Ri.
Concurrently with the invitation to Bruce, they
24
FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERACY
addressed to Pope John XXII a letter of remonstrance
traversing the conduct of the English in Ireland, giving
instances of their cruelty and treachery, their non-ful-
filment of the conditions under which Adrian's Bull
had been issued, and announcing that they had chosen
Edward Bruce to be their king. And they asked the
Pope " out of a regard for justice and the public peace,
mercifully to sanction our proceedings relative to our
said lord the king; prohibiting the King of England,
and our adversaries aforesaid, from further molestation
of us. Or at least be graciously pleased to enforce for
us from them the due requirements of justice." The
Pope's treatment of this remonstrance is typical of the
way in which the policy of the political Papacy has
gone steadily against Ireland. He made no answer to
the remonstrance, but sent a copy of it with all haste
to Edward II, with a covering letter in which he asked
him " to take these matters into your calm, deliberate
consideration ; and confer upon them with your discreet
council, and in this way proceed to command and
enforce a just and speedy correction and reform of the
grievances aforesaid. . . . That so these Irish people,
following more wholesome councils, may render you
the obedience due to their lord, or if (what heaven
forbid) they shall be disposed to persist in foolish
rebellion, they may convert their cause into a matter of
open injustice, while you stand excused before God and
man." And later, after Bruce had landed, he issued a
decree excommunicating all who should join him or in
any way assist him.
InJ^Lay 1315, Edward Bruce, with 6^oi^Sc^sJ_a^ed
on the Antrim coast, and was met by the Ulster chiefs.
IiL-the presence of all O'Neill resigned the Crown of
Ireland to Bruce, and Bruce swore to be true to Ireland
and to serve her. -Preparations for a campaign were
begun at once on both sides, and there was a wholesale
suspension of private quarrels. In Connacht Richard
De Burgo, the Red Earl, gathered together all the
25
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
English forces of the West, and to his hosting went
Felim O'Connor, the young King of Connacht, and his
clansmen ; the Lord Deputy gathered the Pale forces
at Dublin and prepared to march north ; and in the
south the Geraldines and Butlers gathered all the
southern English forces. The Irish moved first, and
the English colonists in Antrim — Savages, Mandevilles,
and Bissets — were beaten in a battle near Lough
Neagh, and their holdings occupied. Leaving a detach-
ment to besiege Carrickfergus, the Irish marched
south, and after a short siege took Dundalk and
threatened the Pale.. Then the Red Earl moved from
Athlone, and the Irish chiefs sent envoys to Felim
O'Connor, appealing to his honour and his patriotism
to withdraw from the English and stand in with the
Confederacy in their attempt to drive the English from
Ireland. Felim withdrew his forces accordingly, and
Bruce turned upon De Burgo and gave him an over-
whelming defeat near Ballymena, and thence proceeded
to Dundalk, where he wintered.
In the meantime, the Irish had attacked all over
Ireland, and as England recognized the vital nature
of the struggle, armies were poured into Ireland. In
Leinsterand in Minister the fighting Was local, guerilla
warfare rather than pitched battles, and while it held
the English armies in both provinces, it did no more ;
but Felim O'Connor was master of Connacht, and
Bruce of all Ulster, from Dundalk northwards. Early
in 1316 Bruce marched south, scattered an army of
30,000 under the Deputy at Athy, and a second army
of 15,000 under Roger Mortimer, at Kells, and then
returned to Dundalk, where he was solemnly crowned
as Ard Ri of Ireland. But the English had been left
in possession of Dublin, and armies again poured in,
and they elected to attack Felim O'Connor rather than
Bruce. The armies met at Athenry, where the Con-
nacht Irish, fighting in linen shirts against armour,
were most bloodily and fatally defeated, with a loss in
26
FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERACY
killed of 8,000, including King Felim and most of the
chiefs, and Connacht was triumphantly overrun by the
English.
Early in 1317 Robert Bruce in person came to
Ireland with reinforcements, and the Bruces, at the
head of 30,000 men, marched south and laid siege to
Dublin, an enterprise which should have been under-
taken, and would have been successful, the previous
year after the battles of Athy and Kells. They met
with no opposition in their march, but Dublin was
obstinately defended by Robert Nottingham, its mayor,
and upon a failure to carry it by assault, the Bruces
abandoned the siege and marched south to Limerick,
unmolested. England now sent over another army of
15,000 under Roger Mortimer, the Geraldines and
Butlers had gathered 30,000 at Kilkenny, and in
Connacht De Burgo had gathered all his forces
together after the victory at Athenry, so the Irish,
heavily outnumbered, retreated to Dundalk, where they
wintered. Early in 1318, Robert Bruce returned to
Scotland, promising to return with reinforcements,
but Edward Bruce was impatient, and when De
Bermingham, with the whole English forces, moved
against him, he gave battle at Faughart, though out-
numbered five to one. While he himself held the field
the battle wavered, but he was mortally wounded by
Sir John Maupas, whom he also mortally wounded, and
the Irish army retreated north, beaten but not scattered.
It was the only battle Bruce had lost in Ireland. The
country was now exhausted, and over-run with famine
and pestilence, owing to the three years constant
fighting and the manoeuvring of such huge armies,
both sides burning crops and houses in " enemy terri-
tory," and with Bruce's death the Confederacy
collapsed, the Irish dispersing unmolested to their
homes.
The issue in this struggle was a clean-cut one, and
it appears to have been clearly understood on both
27
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
sides. The English poured men and supplies in on
an unprecedented scale, and it is clear from the State
Papers that the Irish were practically unanimously on
Bruce's side. It is true that the Pope had excommuni-
cated all who should help Bruce, but it is doubtful if
that had any influence on the struggle. The Irish
chiefs certainly paid no heed to it, and their clansmen
probably never knew of it. The Church at that time
was in no position to influence either side materially,
it was so disorganized. " For the territories of the
Church," wrote Domhnall O'Neill to the Pope in 1315,
"are so curtailed, narrowed and mutiliated by them
that some cathedral churches have been plundered of a
moiety, and more than that, of their lands and pro-
perty, while ecclesiastical privileges of every kind are
for the most part entirely abolished by these individuals
here spoken of. And our bishops and prelates are
indiscriminately summoned, arrested, seized upon, and
imprisoned by the Ministers of the King of England in
Ireland ; and though suffering as they do such constant
and serious injuries, they are yet so strongly influenced
by a slavish timidity, that they never venture to bring
before your Holiness any representations concerning
them." It was a fight on a straight issue, which the
English won not by superior valour but by virtue of
the fatal Irish indifference to Dublin. When Bruce in
1316 had cleared Ulster, taken Dundalk, swept down
through Meath and Leinster, and beaten at Athy and
Kells the only two English armies then in Ireland, he
had only to take Dublin to win. But Dublin was not
even attacked, and next year when it was attacked it
was attacked only half-heartedly. In the whole war,
of the series of battles fought, the Irish lost three—
Athenry, a battle in Leix, where the O'Mores were
beaten in 1317, and Faughart — yet they were beaten,
and so long as Dublin remained in English hands they
had no chance of winning. For through Dublin came
English army after army.
FIRST NATIONAL CONFEDERACY
The three years campaign so impoverished and
devastated Ireland as to make the annalists declare
that " there never was a better deed done in Ireland
than the killing of Edward Bruce," but its general effect
was wholly to the good. It uprooted the colonists over
almost the whole of Ireland, exhausted the Anglo-Irish
nobles, and so weakened English power in Ireland that
it lessened until only Dublin was held, and that only by
paying black-rent to Mac Murchadha — but it was held.
CHAPTER V
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION— FAUGHART TO
THE STATUTE OF KILKENNY (1318-1367)
By throwing together every available man, and by
hard fighting, the English had preserved their grip on
Ireland. They had beaten a purely Irish army at
Athlone and a mixed Scoto-Irish army at Faughart,
and were left at the close of the war with a victorious
army and no regular opponents. Yet, for two centuries
thereafter, English power in Ireland was almost negli-
gible. It declined rapidly until it was almost at
vanishing point, and it did not flourish again until the
Tudors took up the running. That weakening of
English power, not alone of their political influence,
but also of their civilization, sprang out of circumstances
in which the short three years' campaign of Edward
Bruce was the determining factor. That campaign
went nearest of any attempt to annihilate English
power in Ireland.
At the time of the landing of Bruce the English were
settling down into a permanency in the country. The
period of soldiering and adventuring pure and simple
had passed, and under the shadow of their arms they
planted colonies. The English and Irish were inter-
mixed everywhere, but the English were in the minority,
and were banded together much more effectively by
that fact, and the fact that they fully realized that their
best chance of keeping their place in the country lay in
standing together against the Irish. They had come
to be tacitly accepted, in a sense, by the Irish of the
various districts and yet, while in a sense of the Nation,
were preponderatingly not of it. They held by English
30
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
law and customs, paid allegiance to England, had not
yet developed any separate Anglo-Irish individuality,
any sense of a difference between themselves and the
English born, and were gradually forming themselves
into a network all over Ireland: overshadowed every-
where by the Irish, but still there. After Bruce all
that was changed. Bruce's campaign broke up their
organization, and sent them back again to the soldiering
days of the earlier invaders. And, because the English
monarchs were too busy with Scottish and French wars
to send armies to Ireland, they were faced either with
assimilation to the Irish nation or the payment of
tribute to the chiefs. Some of them chose the one,
and some the other. From a policy of aggression they
were forced to fall back upon a policy of defence.
Bruce's campaigns had been thorough, much more
thorough than the Irish campaigns previously or since.
In a hostile district he pulled down and destroyed
everything, and left the country bare. His successive
victories in his first campaign drove the colonists to
abandon their farms for the time being, to turn soldiers,
and to concentrate altogether upon the task of fighting
him, and when the war was over and Bruce dead, the
Irish were once more in actual possession of most of
the land. The English occupiers, where they attempted
to re-occupy, had to come to a compromise with the
Irish, and in a great many cases they wearied of the
task and returned to England — so much so that a law
was passed forbidding any Englishman of Ireland to
return to England — and the influx of fresh colonists
ceased almost wholly.
The colonists who remained found themselves outside
the towns, isolated in groups, and hedged around on all
sides by a vigorous Irish civilization. Their organiza-
tion broken and their hopes of a complete conquest
gone, they gradually adopted Irish manners and customs,
and became to all intents and purposes an Irish clan.
This assimilation was also helped considerably by two
31
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
things. Firstly, the policy of the English kings of
exacting feudal dues from the Anglo-Irish nobles for
their Scottish and French wars. Many of them went
away to these wars and found on their return that their
land had reverted to Irish tribe land. The big nobles,
Ormond, Desmond, Kildare, etc., did not suffer in this
way, but in numerous cases it happened thus to their
feudal dependants. Secondly, whenever the feudal
succession devolved upon a woman, there was usually
a reversion to Irish tribe land. This was, on the surface,
the cause of the De Burgos throwing off allegiance to
the English in 1333. When William De Burgo, grand-
son of the Red Earl, died in June 1333, his estates,
according to feudal law, went to his infant daughter.
The other members of the family refused to acknow-
ledge this, and William and Edmund De Burgo promptly
renounced allegiance to England, discarded the feudal
law, adopted Irish laws, apparel and language, and
called themselves Mac 'Liam Uachtar and Mac 'Liam
lachtar, dividing up the De Burgo estates between
them. This example was widely followed, and many
of the English colonists turned Irish, adopting Irish
names, language, laws, and apparel, so that the nobles
became to all intents and purposes Irish chiefs, with
this difference, that many of them, including of course
Desmond, Ormond, Kildare and others of similar rank,
still kept up, through Dublin, the connection with
England. The minor men were in fact wholly assimil-
ated, but the big men, Kildare and his equals, while
speaking Irish, and living to a large extent as Irish
chieftains, yet kept up the English connection; and
and the English kept a Governor in Dublin who was
nominally Governor of Ireland, and whose mission
actually was to keep the big nobles conscious of
England's existence, and attached to the English
interest, until such time as the English could again
undertake a conquest. By playing Desmond, Ormond,
and Kildare against one another in the usual English
32
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
fashion, they were prevented from throwing in their lot
with the Irish. Each in turn would be denounced as a
traitor, and thus be driven into explanations and bursts
of loyalty which kept him securely attached to the
English interest. Yet that attachment was of the
slightest, and they were bound to the Irish by what
should have been stronger ties, for they intermarried
with them, hunted and feasted with them, fostered
amongst them, adopted coign and livery in the Irish
manner, and lived mostly after the style of Irish chief-
tains. But the slender thread binding them to England
was available, and served, to draw over a stronger
thread, and a stronger, until England had Ireland
down.
The famous Statute of Kilkenny, passed by an Anglo-
Irish Parliament at Kilkenny in 1367, is the best evidence
of the state of English power in Ireland two centuries
after the invasion. That Statute has been commonly
referred to as a malevolent enactment against the Irish.
It is actually nothing of the kind, being merely an
attempt to prevent, by legislation, the assimilation of
the English in Ireland. It was specifically framed to
apply only within the English territories, and did not
even pretend to be an Act to bind all Ireland. (Two
centuries later, when English power had a much wider
grip, the Act of course held good.)
The preamble says : " Whereas, at the conquest of the
land of Ireland, and for a long time after, the English
of the said land used the English language, mode of
riding, and apparel, and were governed and ruled, both
they and their subjects called Betaghes, according to
the English law; but now many English of the said
land, forsaking the Englsih language, manners, mode
of riding, laws and usages, live and govern themselves
according to the manners, fashion, and language of the
Irish enemies; and also have made divers marriages
and alliances between themselves and the Irish enemies
aforesaid; whereby the said land, and the liege people
D 33
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
thereof, the English language, the allegiance due to
our lord the king, and the English laws there, are put
in subjection and decayed, and the Irish enemies exalted
and raised up, contrary to reason," and therefore, it
goes on, this Act is passed. Now this preamble directs
the act specifically against the English of Ireland and
none other, and gives as its justification the fact that
English laws and customs and language are "put in
subjection and decayed." The various clauses of the
Act will show the positions more clearly.
Clause I enacts that the Church shall "be free, and
have all her franchises without injury, according to the
the franchises granted by our lord the king, or his
progenitors," etc.
Clause II enacts that "no alliance by marriage, gos-
sipred, fostering of children, concubinage, or by amour,
nor in any other manner, be henceforth made between
the English and Irish of one part, or of the other part;
and that no Englishman or other person, being at peace,
do give or sell to any Irishman, in time of peace or war,
horses or armour, nor any manner of vehicles in time
of war," etc. From which we may gather that alliance
by marriage, fostering, and gossipred was common, and
also trading intercourse. As a matter of fact, the
English in the towns always traded with the Irish,
arms and everything else, despite statutes.
Clause III enacts that " every Englishman do use
the English language and be named by an English
name, leaving off entirely the manner of naming used
by the Irish ; and that every Englishman use the
English custom, fashion, mode of riding and apparel,
according to his state ; and if any Englishman, or Irish
living amongst the English, use the Irish language
amongst themselves, contrary to this ordinance, and
thereof be attainted, his lands and tenements, if he have
any, shall be seized into the hands of his immediate
lord . . . And that no Englishman who shall have
the value of one hundred pounds of land by the year
34
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
shall ride otherwise than on a saddle in the English
fashion, . . . and also that beneficed persons of holy
Church, living amongst the English shall use the
English language . . . and they shall have respite in
order to learn the English language and to provide
saddles, between this and the feast of Saint Michael
next coming," etc. ; showing the prevalence of Irish
names, customs, fashions, apparel, and language
amongst all classes of the English.
Clause IV enacts " that no Englishman be governed
in the termination of their disputes by March law nor
Brehon law which reasonably ought not to be called
law, being a bad custom, . . . and that no difference
of allegiance shall henceforth be made between the
English born in Ireland and the English born in
England, by calling them English hobbe, or Irish
dog." etc. Note the deliciously English description
of the Brehon law as "a bad custom," and the plain
sign of the rift between the Anglo-Irish and the raw
English, a rift which had grown enormously since it
was ordained in 1338, that all officers of the Crown in
Ireland should be English born.
Clause V regulates the price and sale of imported
victuals.
Clause VI enacts that "the commons of the said land
of Ireland, who are in the different marches at war, do
not henceforth, use the plays which men call hurlings,
with great sticks upon the ground, from which great
evils and maims have arisen ... but that they do
apply and accustom themselves to use and draw bows,
and throw lances, and other gentlemanlike games," etc.
Clause VII orders that diligent inquiry be made into
the criminal condition of the English territories, so that
malefactors may be punished and wrongs redressed. It
leaves the inference that, within the English sphere,
crime was rampant.
Clause VIII forbids anyone to confiscate the tithes
due to the Church, whether he be "great or little."
35
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Clause IX. " That nobody who has been excommu-
nicated shall be received into the king's favour until
he has * made satisfaction.'"
Clause X. Wars to be undertaken in future by the
"Council of our lord the king," and that "the Irish
enemies shall not be admitted to peace until they shall
be finally destroyed, or shall make restitution fully of
the costs and charges expended on that war," etc.
Clause XI. " That if any Irishman becomes debtor
to an Englishman, no other Irish person belonging to
him shall be seized or ransomed for such debt." From
which we gather that it had been the practice to hold
an Irishman's relatives responsible for his debts.
(Irishman here means Irishman living in English
territory.)
Clause XII. "That no Irishman shall pasture or
occupy the lands belonging to the English, or Irish
being at peace, against the will of-the lords of the said
lands," etc. Alluding to the habit of the Irish on the
borders grazing their cattle on English land without
even a " by your leave."
Clause XIII. " That no Irishman of the nations of
the Irish be admitted into any cathedral or collegiate
church by provision, collection, or presentation of any
person, nor to any benefice of Holy Church, amongst
the English of the land," etc.
Clause XIV prohibits religious houses "situate
amongst the English " from receiving any Irishmen to
their professions.
Clause XV enacts that " whereas, the Irish agents
who come amongst the English spy out the secrets,
plans and policies of the English, whereby great evils
have often resulted ; it is agreed and forbidden that
any Irish agents, that is to say, pipers, story-tellers,
bablers, rimers, mowers, nor any other Irish agent shall
come amongst the English," etc. This clause is a
tribute to the work done by the Irish bards and sean-
chuidhe. It has often been quoted as an attack on
36
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
bards as such, but it is clear that it was an attack on
their utility for military purposes.
Clauses XVI to XXVI refer to minor matters, mostly
law administration in the English territories.
Clause XXVII prohibits the English from making
war upon one another.
The remaining clauses (28 to 35) contain nothing
germane to the point I am illustrating, save that they
deal, with 16 to 26, mostly with the regulations and
enforcement of law, and show that there was no real
law in the Pale at the time, that revenues were uncol-
lected, and robbery and violence unpunished, that the
strongest took and justice did not prevail.
Justifiable though the Statute of Kilkenny was —
from the English point of view — it is doubtful if it was
at that time more than a pious expression of a policy
so far as those to whom it was addressed were con-
cerned. They did not carry it out, and there was no
central English power in the country strong enough to
compel them to do so. It was a statute, the observance
of which meant to most of the English the giving up
of something to which they had been accustomed, trade
and intercourse with the Irish, Irish manners and
customs, etc., and that they would not do unless com-
pelled to do so ; and for centuries the English lacked
the power to so compel them.
Sir John Davies, in his discourse, states that for several
years after the passing of the Act, it was observed, and
did much benefit to English powers in the country.
But even that is open to doubt, for we find English
power still dwindling after its passing. But apart
from its importance in proving how mythical is the
old belief that Ireland was conquered in a few years,
it was of vast importance in serving as a guide to future
generations of English ameliorators on what lines the
subjugation of Ireland was finally to be attempted. In
the enactments of succeeding Parliaments may be found
re-enactments of portions of this statute, proving that
37
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
it was not obeyed, and proving also that the English
governing impulse persistently followed the lines laid
down in it. For it was the first enunciated policy of
establishing an English civilization in the country
which should root out of English territories all Irish
civilization. It was aimed only at the inhabitants of
those parts of the country which were under English
government, but, as time went on, and that influence
grew, it was on the same lines that Irish civilization
was attempted to be driven out of all Ireland. It was
a case of the English mind in Ireland driven into a
corner by the Irish mind, and then coming to a realiza-
tion of the fact that it was mind, not force, that was
telling, and struggling hard for its own separate
existence. Then, when it got on top, it aimed at the
Irish mind.
CHAPTER VI
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION— ART MOR MAC
MURCHADHA (1377-1417)
The great Art MacMurchadha was but twenty years
of age when he succeeded his father as King of Leinster
in 1377, and he had been leading his people since he
was sixteen. Art the elder left to his son the headship
of the Leinster tribes, alliance and friendship with
them, and rule up to the walls of Dublin, with a tribute
of eighty marks per annum from the King of England's
treasury, and while he lived Art the younger maintained
all these. The strength of England, and the treachery
of England, alike failed against him, and during the
forty years of his reign he was undisputed King of
Leinster. Specially trained to hold the fruits of the
wise government and policy of the line of capable kings
that preceded him, he proved himself from the
beginning fully equal to his responsibilities, and rolled
back the strongest and best appointed English armies
that had yet appeared in Ireland, headed with all pomp
by a King of England.
Art the elder had beaten the English so severely in
so many battles, and had so consolidated his power,
that they left Art Mor severely alone for a long time
after his accession, paying him his tribute of eighty
marks a year regularly. And meantime his power grew,
the Pale became more and more narrow, and when he
married an Anglo-Irish wife he refused to abide by the
Statute of Kilkenny, according to which her lands in
Kildare became Crown property. No English Viceroy
dared to attack him, and at length Richard II of
England, stung to action by the taunts of his rivals for
39
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
the Imperial German Crown, resolved to conquer
Ireland anew, and in particular Art MacMurchadha.
The English Parliament granted him supplies, he
issued an edict to the Anglo-Irish to drop their Irish
manners and customs and rally to his banner, and
landed at Waterford with 34,000 men in 1394. After
a week's feasting and display at Waterford, Richard
determined to go to Dublin, via Ross, which was
strongly fortified; but Art, who had already foreseen
this, pounced down on Ross first, overwhelmed the
defence, and burned the town and castle. This upset
Richard's plans, and forced him to make a march
inland, where of course he was more exposed, as Art
wanted him, to ambuscade and to guerilla tactics
generally. He had meant to march along the coast-
line to Ross, and thence to Dublin, but now he was
forced to make for Kilkenny instead. All along the
line of march the Leinstermen harassed him, cutting
off stragglers, laying ambuscades, making night attacks,
and generally wearing him out. And by the time
Richard reached Kilkenny he had given up the idea
of smashing up the Leinstermen by main force, and
determined to try soft talk. So he sent his Earl
Marshal from Kilkenny into Carlow, where Art was,
to treat with him. And the terms of peace offered
were surely comical. The Leinster chiefs were called
upon to surrender all their lands in Leinster to Richard,
and in return they were to have any lands they could
take from " the King's other Irish enemies " elsewhere.
It is difficult to think of this offer as having been
seriously made, but it was, and it shows the vanity and
incompetency of Richard. Art replied that he could
treat only with King Richard himself, and that, so far
from giving up any of his land he would have to get
the restoration of his wife's land in Kildare. This broke
up the conference, and Richard, an angry Richard,
made his way northwards through Hi-Kinsellagh,
with Art on both flanks and in his rear, messing his
40
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
army up amongst bogs, disturbing his sleep, sweeping
the country along his line of march clear of all food
of any description, and making things generally
uncomfortable. When Richard finally reached Dublin
he had lost an immense number of men, the discipline
and enthusiasm of the army were gone, and yet he had
fought no battle. Art played the Fabian game, and
with complete success. The Four Masters put it
tersely — " MacMurchadha, that is Art, son of Art,
waged war against the King of England and his people,
and many of them were slain by him ; he finally came
to the King's residence, at the request of the English
and Irish of Leinster, where he was made prisoner on
a charge made against him by the Earl of Ormond,
the Lord Justice; he was soon after set at liberty."
This visit to Dublin was paid at Richard's request,
and it was paid as the visit of one king to another. Art
had not then learned to trust an Englishman only with
arms in his hands and an army at his back, and so he
came to Dublin at Richard's invitation, to be thrown
into prison on a charge trumped-up by Ormond.
O'Brien of Thomond, O'Connor of Offaly, and
O'Neill of Tyrone were in Dublin at the same time —
the northern chiefs had met Richard at Drogheda, and
come to Dublin with him — but Art was the only one
against whom an attempt was made. The charge,
whatever it was, was not sustained — indeed it seems
likely that it was never formulated — and he was
released after a short time and left Dublin. The
English historians, as usual, assert that all the Irish
chiefs submitted to Richard, a thing which is extremely
unlikely, and of which there is no other evidence. But
in the midst of his feasting, Richard was recalled to
England to look after his own affairs, and he left Roger
Mortimer, Earl of March, as his Deputy in Ireland.
Mortimer was young and ambitious, anxious to do
what Richard had failed in, and his first attempt to do
so opened King Art's eyes to the folly of trusting
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
himself to the word or decency of an Englishman. In
all peace and friendship Art was invited to a banquet,
to which he came, attended only by his harper, who,
observing that the castle was being surrounded by
armed men, played Art's battle song on the harp. The
warning was given and taken just in time, and Art got
free just before the trap closed. " He made his escape
despite of them," say the Four Masters, "by the
strength of his hand and bravery, and they were not
able to subdue him." This was in 1395, and as Art
would never again trust himself in English hands,
Mortimer was forced to try conclusions with him in the
field, and he did so in 1398, with the whole forces of
the Pale. The result was that his army was scattered
at Kells, himself slain, and English influence in Ireland
practically confined to the cities of Waterford and
Dublin.
The news of this victory sent King Richard into a
rage, and he made all haste to gather an army together,
and landed in Waterford for the second time in 1399,
with an army of 20,000 men. In its essentials this
expedition was a reproduction of the previous one,
except that it was far more disastrous to the English.
A French knight, who accompanied Richard, has left
us an account of it, which shows how effective Art's
tactics were. As before, he hung on the army on its
march, and harassed it constantly both day and night ;
retreating through Carlow into Wicklow, clearing the
country of all food. Twice Richard sent messengers to
him to submit, and twice Art replied that he would
continue to fight and harass him, and to defend his
country until the day of his death. So Richard pressed
on, with an army whose discipline became less every
day, whose numbers were thinned every day and every
night, whose nerves were awry owing to the constant
harassing of the mobile Leinstermen, and whose food
became less and less until they were fasting ; and the
whole army had like to have died of starvation were it
42
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
not for the advent, at or near Arklow, of supplies from
Dublin, supplies for which the famished soldiers fought
with one another. Next morning MacMurchadha pro-
posed a parley, and Richard joyfully sent the Earl of
Gloucester. Art, taught by experience, came to the
parley with his men visible not far off, and it came to
nothing. He refused to submit, and Richard swore
he would not leave Ireland until he had him in his
power, living or dead. He pressed on to Dublin with
the remnant of his army, the Leinstermen escorting
them the whole journey, and set about new prepara-
tions to humble Art ; but after six weeks in Dublin, he
was no nearer to getting another army, and in that
time he lost England, for Henry of Lancaster invaded
it, won it, and Richard returning in haste, was deposed
and killed.
Richard's departure left Art triumphant over Leinster,
Dublin paying him black rent, and all his lieutenants,
the O'Tooles, O'Byrnes, O'Nolans, etc., flourishing.
And he took advantage of it to sweep away, or garrison,
the castles still in English hands. Accordingly, he
swept Wexford clear, taking Camolin, Ferns, Ennis-
corthy, and Wexford town, and then going North, he
burnt English castles in Carlow and Kildare, and cleared
his ancient kingdom. In the succeeding years he was
twice attacked, first in 1407 by Sir Stephen Scroope,
Lord Deputy, who was beaten and driven in on Kil-
kenny, a city which was always stubbornly held for the
English interest by the Butlers, and again in 1408 by
Thomas Duke of Lancaster, son of Henry IV, who
came over as Lord Deputy and, following precedent,
tried a fall with Art, He gathered together the Pale
forces, the Butlers, the Dublinmen, and his own, and
Art met him at Kilmainham and utterly routed him,
wounding him severely into the bargain. The beaten
army was driven in on Dublin, but a siege of that place
was not attempted. Thenceforward there was no
English attack in force upon him. They paid him his
43
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
black rent regularly, and he spent the last years of his
Ifein peace and quietness, ruling the kingdom with a
strong and sure hand. With the exception of an occa-
sional skirmish with the English of Wexford, who
refused him tribute once or twice, he was not called
upon to do any further fighting, and died in 1417 — from
suspected poisoning — in the sixtieth year of his age.
There are names as great in Irish history, Shane and
Hugh O'Neill, and Red Hugh O'Donnell, for instance,
there are many men who were greater in some respects
than Art Mor MacMurchadha, but there are none whose
life policy and government were so effective and fault-
less, so absolutely above criticism, as were his. He
shares with Shane O'Neill the distinction of having
never been beaten by the English in battle (Shane's two
defeats were at the hands of the O'Donnells), and he
has the higher credit of never having lost a battle at
all; and that brings me to what is perhaps the most
creditable of his achievements. During the forty years
of his kingship he governed Leinster without a rival,
without any internal dissension, and, so far as I have
been able to gather, he never drew his sword against a
fellow-countryman. In a reign of forty years that is a
considerable achievement. The O'Byrnes, O'Tooles,
and O'Nolans acted with him and under his direction
against the common enemy, and their alliance was never
broken, and King Richard with his army of over 30,000
men could not withdraw one single Leinster chief from
Art's following. With his own Leinstermen only and
aid from O'Carroll and O'Connor he smashed up the
two biggest armies England had yet sent into Ireland,
and under an English King, and he died free and
victorious. His victories had an effect, not only on his
own Leinster, but on the whole of Ireland, for during
his forty years' reign there was no serious English
expedition to the South, North, or West. With an
enemy so active and enterprising at their gates, the
English dared no more than rush an occasional
44
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
marauding expedition, and everywhere their influence
declined, and their colonists, hemmed in, paid tribute
to the neighbouring Irish tribes. With Dublin hemmed
in, Art hemmed in English power in Ireland, and it
declined everywhere.
It has been said of him that he was merely a provin-
cial chief, and had no idea of an Irish nation. But he
lived in, and was of, the Irish nation. It cannot be too
clearly stated that the English invasion never appeared
to the Irish kings to be a serious attempt to strangle
them until after Kinsale. Outside Dublin the English
had no power in Ireland in Art's time, and he would be
a wise man indeed who would discern danger from
Dublin. Shane O'Neill did discern it later — but I am
only concerned here to point out that Art did have an
idea of the Irish nation and was a part of the living
nation; what he did not have the idea of was that
English power was to overwhelm the country. He
never made an attempt on Dublin, because he never
had the forces necessary to carry on the siege of that
place. After Kilmainham, indeed, he might have taken
Dublin had he pressed hard after the beaten army, but
he was a cautious man and was satisfied with the
victory.
Bruce, aided chiefly by the clansmen of the North,
had kept the English so busy in his short campaign that
the Leinster chiefs were enabled to regain their lands
within sight of the stronghold of English power; and
Art MacMurchadha paid back that debt, for he kept
them so busy in Leinster that they never went outside
it during his reign, and so the disintegration caused by
the campaigns of Bruce still grew. "Since his time
until the thirty-ninth year of Queen Elizabeth," writes
Sir John Davies, "there was not any army sent over of
a competent strength or power to subdue the Irish;
but the war was made by the English colonists only to
defend their borders."
45
CHAPTER VII
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION— ART MOR TO
SILKEN THOMAS (1417-1534).
Edward Bruce had given the first effective blow to
the organization of the English colonists in Ireland, and
had initiated the resumption — or rather initiated the
conditions which brought about the resumption — by
the Irish of most of the land of Ireland outside some of
the towns. Art MacMurchadha's forty years' onslaught
on the Pale, his hemming in of Dublin, his defeat of
every English army which landed in Ireland in his time,
had ensured the continuance of the disintegration of
the colonists' organization, and split them up into small
bands, fighting, each for existence, surrounded on all
sides by the Irish, and either becoming annihilated or
paying to the Irish the ordinary dues of a minor chief
to the head of his clan. For a hundred years after the
death of Art Dublin stood practically alone, the nominal
seat of English government, but in reality just a fort,
held for England with great difficulty, and only by
paying black rent to MacMurchadha. It had no power
over the English settlements in other parts of Ireland,
and these all stood alone also; so that at this period
there was practically no effective English power, qua
English, in Ireland. Some of the most famous of
England's soldiers — e.g., Sir John Talbot — were sent
over from time to time as Lords Lieutenant, but no
large army could be sent, and there was therefore no
attempt made to do more than hold Dublin. Occa-
sionally a so-called Parliament was called and held —
with profuse apologies from absent Cork and Limerick
and other representatives, that they could not get to
Dublin through the "Irishe ennemie" — and an attempt
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
made to bind the English in Ireland again into a united
body, but they came to nothing. Irish civilization was
in full operation everywhere, and English civilization
declined. All the Anglo-Irish Parliaments give evidence
of the desperate straits to which they were subjected.
One or other portion of the Statute of Kilkenny was
re-enacted at each of them, and fresh acts of a similar
nature were enacted and re-enacted, but without avail;
until at length in dire distress they built a ditch, after
the example of the Roman wall of Agricola, around the
Northern limits of the Pale, fortified it at intervals with
castles, and strove by this means to keep the Irish out,
laying down stringent penalties for any injury done to
this ditch. The Dublin treasury was empty for most
of the period, and time and again MacMurchadha's
black rent was levied by force from unwilling colonists.
The English of Wexford also paid him black rent;
Louth and Oriel paid it to the O'Neills; Cork to
MacCarthy; Limerick to O'Brien; Kilkenny and Tip-
perary to O'Carroll of Ely; Meath and Kildare to
O'Connor of Offaly; the English of Connacht to
O'Donnell.
It was a time, the clearest thing about which is that
English power in Ireland was at vanishing point, and
could have been pushed into the sea like a stone down
a precipice, and a time which is perhaps the most mis-
understood by historians. Considering Irish history
from an excessively modern outlook, narrow and
unscholarly, with no conception of the historic Irish
nation, with no regard to the Irish social quality, the
particular character of the Irish civilization, the pecu-
liarities and strengths of the Irish political system, they
have asked frantically why the English were not swept
out, and instead of trying to answer that question by
sifting the evidence, have taken refuge in the safer and
easier modern method of asserting that the Irish were
then little removed from barbarism, without unity or
patriotism or civilization, fools governed by fools.
47
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
But that is not the correct answer, but the fool's
answer. Ireland was not then barbaric, nor unpatriotic,
nor was it just a mass of people fighting with each
other all the year round. The mass of Irish trade at
this time, the general level of culture, the wealth and
prosperity everywhere, prove beyond doubt that Irish
civilization was strong, and vigorous, and prosperous
at this time ; and the events here reviewed, the triumph
of Irish civilization over English civilization, the assimi-
lation of the English colonists, alone give the lie to the
charges of inefficiency and barbarousness which are
so commonly flung at the men of this period. The
Irish genius was against centralization and was instinc-
tively federal. If there had been in Ireland a despotic
monarchy, a feudal civilization which ground down
the people and exalted the nobles, it is probable that
the English would have been driven out finally at this
period ; but the Irish national genius was in harmony
with a conception of freedom and humanity which a
mammon-riden world has never known elsewhere, and
through the centuries it fought obstinately for its own
conception of the proper ordering of things. By
adopting the feudal organization it could have driven
the English out in six months, but all its instincts
were anti-feudal, and its innate aversion to feudalism,
its innate impulse towards a social and political
organization which would generate the maximum
amount of freedom and culture, were stronger than
the impulse of the English invasion. And so it stuck
to its fine ideal and, if it went down temporarily, it
went down fighting, and with honour. In an Irish
civilization every place where men live and foregather
would be a centre of culture, a fountain of light, as
were so many spots in Ireland in the fifth and sixth
centuries, but in the modern feudalistic civilization
whatever culture there is is centralized and rooted in
the biggest cities.
With this before our minds the answer to the
THE GREAT ASSIMILATION
oft-repeated question why the English were not driven
out is obvious. They were not driven out because
they were so powerless that they did not hurt, and
because the natural Irish impulse was to assimilate,
not to exterminate. The territory of every Irish clan
was in its own hands, and the seacoast towns, Dublin,
and Cork, and Wexford, and Limerick, did homage
to the neighbouring chiefs. The chiefs did not foresee
that England would send army after army into Ireland,
through Dublin, until she was down, but for this they
cannot reasonably be blamed. The Irish genius,
having surmounted the invasion of the Northmen, and
kept its political and social organization intact, saw no
reason why it should not also surmount the English
invasion and retain its political and social organization
intact. And it almost succeeded. At this time, indeed,
the chances were all in its favour : it had assimilated
the English settlers everywhere save in some of the
towns, and the triumphant tide of its civilization grew
daily stronger against the last barriers of English
civilization in Ireland — the walls of Dublin.
You are to see Ireland, then, at this period, not a
confused mass of warring clans, without order or
civilization, but a nation passing through the tribulation
and discord of invasion, with its social and political
organization still vigorous, untouched by the poison of
feudal institutions, assimilating its invaders, imposing
on them its language, and laws, and customs, moving
on again towards that goal to which before the invasion
it was tending, the goal of a free, democratic nation,
with a civilization and a culture equally amongst its
common people as amongst its nobles, in the remote
country places as in the cities.
49
CHAPTER VIII
THE GERALDINES— SILKEN THOMAS
(1534)
" These Geraldines ! these Geraldines ! — not long our air they
breathed :
Not long they fed on venison, in Irish water seethed ;
Not often had their chi;dren been by Irish mothers nursed,
When from their full and genial hearts an Irish feeling burst !"
Hibernicis ipsis Hiberniores is the verdict which
has been most commonly passed upon the Geraldines,
and yet it is a verdict which requires much qualifica-
tion and explanation. Irish they were in manners and
customs, and largely in blood after some generations,
but never wholly Irish in policy or in outlook. Their
history which, in its essentials, is also the history of
every other Norman group which settled in Ireland,
shows clearly the malevolence of English policy in
Ireland and the fatality of any connection, however
slender, with England.
Garrett Mor of Kildare, the great Earl of Desmond,
Silken Thomas the Gallant, James Fitzmaurice, Lord
Edward ! Go over all the Geraldines, and how many of
them stand for anything to us, how many of them have
taken a place with the honoured of the Irish race ?
Just three, Silken Thomas, James Fitzmaurice, and
Lord Edward, the only three of the Geraldines who
repudiated the English connection and tried to make
Ireland an independent nation. All the others are but
names, names of viceroys, of chieftains, gallant and
noble, and generous, I grant you, but not of moment.
The ups and downs of the struggle between the
Geraldines and the Butlers for power and wealth
under the English crown are of no permanent interest
50
THE GERALDINES— SILKEN THOMAS
to Ireland, but she remembers three who struck for a
nation, and not for pelf or power.
During the first four centuries of the English invasion,
when England found herself unable to conquer Ireland,
and was forced to rely upon the maintenance of a grip
on the country through her soldiers and colonists
keeping the Irish divided, there were two courses open
to the Geraldines, to stay in Ireland as an English
garrison, or to turn Irish and go into the nation. They,
unfortunately, did both — paradoxical as it sounds.
They were both English and Irish, belonging wholly
to neither and claiming kinship with both. They
became Irishized very quickly and adopted all Irish
customs, differing in no respect from the native Irish
chiefs, so that they were recognized in the country as
new clans. But they were Irish only so long as the
Irish in their neighbourhood were the stronger, and let
come an English Viceroy with an army and they were
the King's subjects, coming to his Parliaments and his
courts, paying his taxes and fighting his wars. To all
intents and purposes they were independent chiefs
during these four centuries, and levied \var and made
peace as they pleased, but they never had the wisdom
or the courage to fight for their own hands against the
tottering power of England, or to fight for their
country's sake. They gave England a nominal
allegiance, while being Irish in speech, habits, outlook,
and in all things else ; and by that nominal allegiance
England held them and us, played them one against
the other, Desmond against Ormond and Kildare
against both ; moving them like chess upon a board, now
Kildare to be deputy — until he grew overstrong — then
Ormond, until he too grew overstrong, then Desmond,
and so on, until the time came when Englaud could
contemptuously crush all three, which she did. Where
now are the noble houses of Kildare, Desmond, and
Ormond, who held Ireland dutifully as England's
subjects ? Down in the dust. They raised themselves,
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
by their many noble qualities and their adoption of Irish
civilization, into the affections of the native Irish, these
followed them, trusted them, and fought for them, and
died for them ; and they, they bent the knee to a power
which was practically impotent then, allowed them-
selves to be set up and pulled down as King's deputies
in a land where they could have been kings had they
the courage, went weakly to the block and to the
scaffold when ordered, protesting always with mighty
asservations that they were " no traitors," led the Irish
who trusted them into an English hell, and at the end
all broken and despoiled, both Geraldine and Irish !
The Irish trusted them, and they led them to destruc-
tion ; they trusted the English and the English led them
to destruction. That is the history of the Geraldines.
The slender connection writh England, nominal though
it was, was their undoing.
Gerald Mor, the Eighth Earl of Kildare, and Gerald,
the Ninth Earl, under Henry VII and Henry VIII,
had raised the power of the Kildare Geraldines to the
highest in Ireland, and had used that power to hold
Ireland as a whole under England. It is difficult to say
now what precisely these two men may have had at the
back of their minds, but they were so able and played
their cards so well that the intrigues of Ormond and
the English adventurers failed to shake them. In
Ireland they used their power as Lords Deputy to
strengthen English influence, and at the same time to
bring about peace, by intermarriage, by treaty, and by
force even, between all Ireland, both of Irish and of
English blood. It was a proceeding which, on the
surface, was an attempt to unify Ireland under the
English crown, and might well have ended as a
Nationalist movement if either of the Earls had thought
to strike at the right time. But they held on too long,
the Tudors got their eyes on them, and in the end the
crash came. The Ninth Earl had raised many enemies
at home and abroad. He it was who had defied Wolsey
52
THE GERALDINES— SILKEN THOMAS
when that Prelate was Chancellor of England. "I
would you and I had exchanged kingdoms but for one
month. I could trust to gather up more crumbs in that
space than twice the revenues of my poor Earldom. I
sleep in a cabin when you lie soft in your bed of down.
I serve under the cope of heaven, when you are served
under a canopy, I drink water out of a skull, when you
drink out of golden cups; my courser is trained to the
field when your jennet is taught to amble," and emerged
from London again Lord Deputy of Ireland. In his
old age, in 1534, he was again summoned to London,
to answer charges of treason, and again he went,
leaving as Deputy behind him, his son Thomas. After
the Earl had been gone a short time, a report was
spread in Ireland that he had been executed, and Silken
Thomas at once threw off allegiance to Henry. With
his Irish bodyguard and harper he rode to St. Mary's
Abbey where the Council sat, and threw the Sword'of
State on the table amongst them. "Say not hereafter
but in this open hostility, which we profess here and
proclaim, we have showed ourselves no villains nor
churls, but warriors and gentlemen. This Sword of
State is yours and not mine, I received it with an Oath
and have used it to your benefit, I should offend mine
honour if I turned the same to your annoyance. Now,
have I need of mine own sword. . . ... . I am none of
Henry's Deputy. I am his foe. I have more mind to
conquer than to govern, to meet him in the field than
to serve him in office." And in reply to the Lord
Chancellor, who remonstrated with him, he said, "As
you would wish me to honour my Prince, so duty
willeth me to reverence my father. Wherefore he that
will with such tyranny execute my innocent parent,
and withal threaten my destruction, I may not nor will
not hold him for my King. And yet, in truth, he was
never our King, but our Lord, as his Progenitors have
been before him. But if it be my hap to miscarry as
you seem to prognosticate, catch 'that catch may., I
53
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
will take the market as it riseth, and will choose rather
to die with valiantness and liberty, than to live under
King Henry in Bondage and Villainy."- He took the
field immediately, and was joined by O'Connor of Offaly
and O'Carroll of Ely — two gallant men who were always
ready to fight the English — and they swept the Pale
clear of English power from end to end. Silken Thomas
was in Dublin, after beating a hastily gathered citizens'
force at Kilmainham, before they had well heard of his
approach, and held it, save the Castle, into which the
officials and garrison had fled. And English power in
Ireland now hung on that Castle. Had he taken it he
would have held Ireland against Henry, for he had by
now sent envoys all over Ireland to the O'Neills and
O'Donnells of Ulster, the O'Connors and Burkes of
Connacht, the McCarthys, O'Briens and Geraldines of
Minister, and there is good reason to believe that they
were preparing to join him. They certainly would have
joined him had he been able, as he intended, to take
Dublin wholly and establish himself there. But the
Castle held out, and he left a portion of his forces to
besiege it, and himself marched against Ormond, who
shut himself up in Kilkenny Castle. The Dublin citizens
took advantage of his absence to break their treaty with
him, shut their gates, and besieged the little force he
had left besieging the Castle, and when he returned he
was unable to gain an entry and gave up the siege.
Outside Dublin he held Leinster, but through Dublin
the English poured reinforcements in. Next year they
took Maynooth Castle by treachery, and a sentence of
excommunication was fulminated against Fitzgerald,
and all who aided him, because some of his men mis-
took an order of his and killed Allen, Archbishop of
Dublin, and his army decreased below the strength at
which he could risk a pitched battle with the English
forces. He therefore adopted guerilla tactics, but he
was at length induced to surrender to Lord Grey, on
promise of pardon. And Henry VIII took him and his
54
THE GERALDINES— SILKEN THOMAS
five uncles — who had not aided him — and hanged and
quartered them at Tyburn. The Earl, his father, had
meanwhile died in prison. A recent writer on Irish
history has referred to this as the "folly" of Silken
Thomas. One might just as well talk of the "folly" of
Emmet, or of Washington, or of any man who does a fine
thing against odds. Silken Thomas's attempt to " cut
the cable," like Emmet's, only just missed success, and
he was a much abler man than he gets credit for. His
bearing and his action re the Sword of State are alto-
gether to his credit, and those, in his own words, of a
warrior and a man of honour. It will be urged, and it
has been urged, that his action was prompted only by
his belief that his father had been executed by Henry.
That may be to the extent that that was the immediate
cause, but it cannot have been the only cause, it was
probably the culminating event of a series which pushed
the Geraldines into that position. And the banner
under which Silken Thomas fought, and nearly won,
was the banner of an Ireland independent, with the
English connection severed. It was a fine thing, nobly
conceived, and gallantly and fearlessly attempted.
Ireland remembers it with gratitude and with pride.
CHAPTER IX
HENRY VIII— REFORMATION HARRY (1534-
As the founder of the Anglican Church in Ireland,
and because of the claim made for him by generations
of sheepish historians that he was accepted as King of
Ireland by the Irish people at the 1541 Parliament,
Henry VIII of England arrests the attention of every
student of Irish history. He was a greater man than
most Irishmen generally imagine, for his Bluebeard
temperament and his indifference to other people's
lives have obscured the more solid and permanent
aspects of his character. A tyrant he certainly was,
but he was a tyrant over the nobles, which was a
refreshing change from so many generations of tyrants
over the people. He was one of the first of the English
monarchs to give his close personal attention and
direction to Irish affairs, and his policy was deep and
consistent — consistent both in Church matters and in
political matters. It will be convenient to deal first
with the Church business and then to outline generally
his whole policy in relation to Ireland.
The Church in Ireland after the English invasion
was composed of two elements, the Pale and the Irish,
which were at continual warfare with one another.
Where the English influence held good the Church
was English in outlook and anti-Irish in policy, and
where the Irish influence predominated the contrary
state of things prevailed. But the two elements formed
one Church with common services, common organiza-
tion, common allegiance to Rome. In the generations
since the invasion, the Church had suffered from both
HENRY VIII— REFORMATION HARRY
parties. The English set the bad example of burning
churches, and the Irish followed it to a lesser extent,
so that the Church was weak in prestige, and practically
of no account in temporal affairs on either side.
Henry II as we have seen, tried to collar the Church
and to use it as a means of anglicizing the Irish, but
the English failure to do more than hold a precarious
footing in the country prevented the building of a well-
organized Church, and reduced it practically to a
loosely-united assemblage of local churches, dependent
for subsistence and support on the neighbouring people,
and with nothing approaching to the power and
influence of modern times. That is to say that, pre-
cisely as in the pre-invasion times, the Church was
unable effectively to impress itself as an organization
on a different basis from the social organization of the
people, and its organization reflected that organization,
effective locally and chaotic nationally, the chaos being
heightened by the fact that the English monarchs had
the appointment of the archbishops in their own hands,
and all their archbishops were political archbishops.
In considering the Reformation in Ireland we must
clear our heads of all prejudices either in favour of
Catholicism or Protestantism, and look at the subject
in the light of what we know of Ireland at the time.
The history of the Reformation is full of things which
will not square with the theories put forward by either
side in later generations, and which can only be
explained and understood by a frank admission of the
fact that the Church then was a very different thing,
in organization, in personnel, and in influence from
either of its branches to-day. The mistake of historians
has been to interpret happenings of centuries ago in
the light of modern definitions and modern develop-
ments, and to assume that things meant the same then
as they do now, that there was then no confusion of
ideas, that everything was as clear as it is now. As an
organization the Church did not count in the Ireland
57
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
of that time ; nobody worried about its decrees of
excommunication, nobody regarded it in political
matters, everybody burned its buildings when in
hostile territory. To the majority of the people Rome
was but a name, and the chiefs themselves raised no
objection to the substitution of Henry for the Pope as
head of the Church. But to argue from that that they
had accepted, or were willing to accept, Protestantism
in the modern sense is applying modern prejudices
to happenings of four centuries ago, which is what
partisans of both sides are continually doing.
The Christian Church on the Continent of Europe
had become subject to abuses of all kinds, and had
failed to hold the growing intellectual revival there.
There the Reformation was inevitable. In England
this was, perhaps, also the case to some extent, but it
received its main impetus from Henry's quarrel with
the Pope, from his ambition to be supreme master in
his own house, and his suspicion and distrust of a
strong Church, as of strong men. The causes which
later carried it to a degree for which Henry himself
burned people as " heretics " were mainly political. In
Ireland the Reformation was wholly political and had
no religious significance whatever. Whatever causes
may be adduced to justify the English Reformation,
none such can be adduced to justify the Irish Reforma-
tion. It was as political a Reformation as the first
English Reformation of the Irish Church at Henry IPs
Synod of Cashel. Henry II wanted to collar the
Church and use it as a political weapon. Henry VIII
found that that plan had failed, that even archbishops
appointed by himself in Ireland were sometimes quite
stubborn, and he tried the alternative of planting a
definitely English Church in the country, which should
be at eternal war on points of organization and routine
with the Irish Church. In his Reformation of the
Church in England, he had the bulk of the people with
him, and no serious opposition from the nobility. In
58
HENRY VIII— REFORMATION HARRY
Ireland he had no serious opposition from the chiefs
and the Anglo-Irish nobles, but he had the bulk of the
people against him, not on religious grounds, but
because the Reformation was part of the political game,
and was felt as such.
It was in 1534 that the English Parliament passed
the Act of Supremacy, declaring Henry head of the
Church in England, and the Earl of Ormond,
always more English than the English, hastened to
throw off the supremacy of the Pope, so far as he was
concerned, and to avow his zeal for the reformed
religion. Nobody in Ireland worried about him, and
nobody followed his example, save the officers of the
crown, whose jobs were at stake. It was in 1536, two
years later, that Henry moved an Irish Parliament to
pass an Act of Supremacy. There was strenuous
opposition from the bishops, but finally it was got
through. And in the meantime George Browne, poli-
tical Archbishop of Dublin, created by Henry in 1535,
initiated the Reformation. The reformers in Ireland
were in a difficulty, for they had practically no grounds
on which to urge a Reformation. The Irish Church
was poor, it was disorganized, it was weak, but it was
not corrupt, and the religious Orders, which were
numerous in the country, were the best friends of the
common people. There was, therefore, no point which
the reformers could seize, upon which to hang an appeal
to the people, and they were finally driven to the argu-
ment of force. They had to thrust the Reformed Church
on Ireland at the bayonet's point, with the natural
result. Browne was a bigoted, aggressive man, with
nothing of the ascetic about him, and very little Christian
charity or humility. He had no brains and no imagin-
ation, and ran the Reformation in the style a modern
commercial traveller would adopt in pushing an article.
He began on the Church itself, and made a tour around
Ireland lecturing and preaching to the priests and
bishops. But the Church stood fast to the Papal
59
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
supremacy, and, at the first attack, practically unani-
mously preached against the Reformation. According
to Browne's own story, the result of his tour was the
conversion of ten bishops to the king's supremacy, but
all the others stood aloof. There was practically no
attempt made to preach the new religion to the com-
mon people, the reformers being too busy endeavouring
to build up the framework of an ecclesiastical organiza-
tion. Following hard upon the Act of Supremacy came
the dissolution of the Irish monasteries and Browne's
campaign against "idols." The monasteries in the
districts which English influence could reach were dis-
solved, and their lands and revenues vested in the Crown,
and relics and such like in the churches and in holy
places were all destroyed. This was the beginning of
the Reformation, a time when there was practically no
doctrinal difference, and the only new departure was
the supremacy of Henry instead of the Pope. But the
Irish, to a man, rejected the change which was thrust
upon them by English soldiers, which heralded itself by
an attack upon the monks and friars, who were the best
friends of the common people, and which carne from
the same source which already threatened their lands
and property more than enough — England. For con-
venience sake I have used the word "Reformation" in
discussing this business, but in truth there was no
Reformation. The Irish Church stood firm, and under-
went neither a Reformation nor a schism. What
happened was that another Church was, as a political
move, planted bodily down side by side with the ancient
Church, enriched with land and with Church buildings
stolen from the ancient Church, and petted and fostered
ever since. The Irish Reformation was not a Refor-
mation, but an invasion. Its effect was to increase the
Church power with the people — although that power
was not, in truth, great until the eighteenth and nine-
teenth centuries — for the Irish saw the English attack
extended from their lands to their Church, and naturally
60
HENRY VIII— REFORMATION HARRY
clung the closer to the Church. A common danger and
a common enemy drew priests and people more closely
together in the centuries which followed, even though
the directing power of the Episcopacy remained on the
whole favourable to the English connection and opposed
to an independent Ireland.
The Anglican Church in Ireland was essentially a
political move, a part of Henry's scheme for building
up an English civilization in Ireland, an English
interest which could be trusted to remain English and
resist assimilation successfully. The Reformation in
England wras largely political prejudice, the so-called
Reformation in Ireland was wholly political prejudice.
There was no religion in it.
61
CHAPTER X
HENRY VIII— "KING" HARRY (1541)
This is how English influence stood in Ireland in 1515,
as reported by an Englishman then in the country.
"There are more than sixty counties, called Regions, in
Ireland, inhabited with the king's Irish enemies; some
regions as big as a shire, some more, some less, unto a
little; where reigneth more than sixty chief captains,
that liveth only by the sword, and obeyeth unto no other
temporal person, only to himself that is strong; and
every of the said captains maketh peace and war for
himself, and holdeth by the sword, and hath imperial
jurisdiction within his realm, and obeyeth unto no other,
English or Irish, except only to such persons as may
subdue him by the sword. . . . Also there be thirty
great captains of the English folk, that followeth the
same Irish order and keepeth the same rule, and every
of them maketh war and peace for himself without any
license of the king or any other temporal person, save
to him that is strongest, and of such that may subdue
them with the sword. Here followeth the names of
the counties that obey not the King's laws, and have
neither justice, neither sheriff under the king: the
County of Waterford, the County of Cork, the County
of Kilkenny, the County of Limerick, the County of
Kerry, the County of Connaught, the County of Ulster,
the County of Carlow, half the County of Uryel, half
the County of Meath, half the County of Dublin, half
the County of Kildare, half the County of Wexford.
All English folks of the said counties be of Irish habits,
of Irish language, and of Irish conditions, except the
cities and the walled towns. . . . Also there is no folk
62
HENRY VIII— « KING" HARRY
daily subject to the king's laws, but half the County of
Uryel, half the County of Meath, half the County of
Dublin, half the County of Kildare." That is to say
English influence and English civilization were confined
to some of the walled towns, and over the whole country
Irish civilization stood triumphant, assimilating the
foreign elements. Henry faced the problem and con-
sidered it, not without much recommendation and
beseeching from various people, Viceroys and ex- Viceroys
of Ireland. It is characteristic of the man that he
remained obdurate to the advice which was constantly
and generally tendered to him to conquer the country
by throwing into it a huge army, carrying on a war of
extermination, and planting the country with English
settlers. This plan was tried later after Henry's
alternative plan had failed. His own plan, which he
stuck to consistently, is laid down in a letter to his
Deputy Surrey in 1520, thus: "We and our Council
think, and surely believe, that in case circumspect and
polite ways be used, ye shall not only bring them to
further obedience for the observance of our la^vs, and
governing themselves according to the same, but also.,
following justice, to forbear to retain rebelliously such
lands and dominions as to us in right appertaineth;
which thing must as yet rather be practised by sober
ways, polite drifts, and amiable persuasions, founded in
law and reason, than by rigorous dealing, comminations,
or other enforcement by strength or violence. And, to
be plain unto you, to spend so much money for the
reduction of that land, to bring the lrishry,in appearance
only, to obeisance . .. . it were a thing of little policy,
less advantage, and least effect. . . . And it may
be said unto them in good manner, that like as we,
being their sovereign lord and prince, though of our
absolute power we be above the laws,. yet we will in no
wise take anything from them, that righteously apper-
taineth to them ; so, of good congruence, they be bound,
both by law, fidelity and liegance, to restore unto us
63
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
pur own. . . . Howbeit our mind is not more than ye
shall impress on them by fearful words that we intend
to expel them from their lands and dominions, lawfully
possessed, but to conserve them in their own, and to
use their advice, aid and assistance, as of faithful sub-
jects, to recover our rightful inheritance. And, there-
fore, if they shall allege that our laws, there used, be
too extreme and rigorous, and that it should be very
hard for them to observe the same; then you may
further ensearch of them, under what manner and by
what laws, they will be ordered and governed ; to the
intent that, if their laws be good and reasonable, they
may be approved, and the rigour of our laws, if they
shall think them too hard, be mitigated, and brought
to such modification as they may conveniently live
under the same. . . . Howbeit, this matter must be
politically, patiently, and secretly handled ; and so to
proceed therein, that the Irish lords conceive no
jealousy or suspicion that they shall be constrained
precisely to live under our laws, or put from all the
lands by them now detained." That is to say, Henry
deliberately shelved the policy of conquest and
extermination and plantation, and adopted the policy
of conciliation : — Get the flies into the king's parlour
first, and then when they are all in shut the door,
make them live under English laws and give up their
lands, but meantime go slowly and craftily, make
alliances with them and treat them decently. With
no more consideration for the Irish than any other
Englishman, Henry had a greater realization of the
difficulties of a war of extermination. His policy was
carried out by his Viceroys, most successfully by Lord
Leonard Grey, one of the ablest Englishmen that came
to Ireland — too able for Henry, who beheaded him.
Grey offered alliance to the chiefs in the first instance,
and, if they refused, gathered all the forces of the Pale
and proceeded against them. He had a good army,
was able, and went against the smaller chiefs first,
HENRY VIII— "KING" HARRY
and when it was found that his alliances only meant a
nominal suzerainty, such as the chiefs were accustomed
to give to any of their own powerful provincial kings,
he usually got his alliance. For a time it seemed as if
O'Neill and O'Donnell would rally all Ireland against
him. After the execution of Silken Thomas and his
uncles, they formed a league, known as the " First
Geraldine League," for the protection of the youngest
and only surviving of the Kildare Geraldines, Gerald,
youngest son of the late Earl, and got him safely to
France. But the League remained intact after its
object was achieved, and O'Neill and O'Donnell
gathered their forces and marched south to join
O'Brien and O'Connor. They swept the Pale on
their way, but when heavy with booty, they were
met by Grey with the Pale forces and beaten with
heavy losses. Grey afterwards attacked O'Connor and
O'Brien singly, and defeated them also. So that within
twenty years the aspect of things changed rosily for
the English ; the chiefs were either in alliance with
Grey or afraid of him, and everything seemed going
well with Henry's policy. Then came his quarrel with
the Pope, and as the result of it came the Parliament
of 1541, at which he was proclaimed King of Ireland.
He had had this in his mind from the start, but it was
rushed because of his feeling that he held Ireland by
virtue of a grant from the Pope, and that what the Pope
had given the Pope might take away. At any rate this
Parliament of 1541 proclaimed him King of Ireland,
and it has been, and still is, claimed that this con-
stituted an acceptance by Ireland of English supremacy,
of an English King, by virtue of the fact that Irish
chiefs sat in that Parliament. Campion, writing in
1571, names MacGillapatrick, and Barry, and "divers
others," but I believe the " Irish " chiefs who sat in
the Parliament were almost wholly the Anglo-Irish —
Ormond, and Desmond, and Barry, and Clanricarde,
and so on. The big Irish chiefs, O'Neill and O'Donnell,
F 65
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
and O'Brien and McCarthy, were not in it. The
importance and significance of that famous Parliament
to the Irish mind were such that none of the Irish
annals so much as mention it. Here was a gathering
which declared a king, at which all the Irish chiefs
were said to be present — we know that O'Neill and
O'Donnell were not — and the Irish never heard of it !
The thing is absurd. Henry was proclaimed King by
the Pale lords, the imported bishops, and perhaps a
sprinkling of the minor Irish chiefs. But even assuming
that they were there, and assuming also the accuracy
of the indentures which are said to have been signed
by the Irish chiefs about this time, accepting Henry as
their feudal king and promising to do him feudal
obedience, even then the whole process is as empty as
ever. For the Irish chiefs had no power in such a
matter to speak for the Irish nation, the chiefs voice
was only one.voice, he wras not the owner of his clan,
or of its territory, or of its rights, but the elected chief
of the clan and the elected guardian of its territory
and rights. And he had no more power or right to
commit it to Henry or feudalism than he had to
commit France or Spain to it.
Briefly, Henry's acceptance as King of Ireland was
an acceptance only by the Pale civilization, by the
English strength in the country. That certain Irish
chiefs later acquiesced in it, and signed indentures
accepting Henry's kingship, his supremacy in the
Church, and his Earldoms, may be accepted. That
they were present in large numbers at the Parliament
is, to say the least of it, doubtful. But the cardinal
facts are that the chiefs had neither power nor right
to speak for their respective clans, that the Parliament
made so little impression on the Irish mind that the
annals do not even mention it, and that the clansmen,
in cases where the arrangement was known, repudiated
it instantly.
Henry's policy, generally, was deep. He believed
66
HENRY VIII— "KING" HARRY
more than most people who now talk of it in a Union
" under the English Crown," and he meant to reconcile
the Irish people gradually to the idea, by persuasion
and not by force, and to exact from the chiefs the
feudal duties and tributes which made his strength in
England. Here, as at all other points, the Irish
civilization broke the plan. It meant a subjugation
of both chiefs and people, a curtailing of their power
and authority, and here he had both chiefs and people
against him. He induced some of the chiefs to give
him a nominal adhesion by the threat of his army, by
distributing titles, and by giving them some of the
monastic lands, but he never had a man of the people
with him. The clansmen kept their souls and their
freedom for some time yet, in spite of " all the resources
of civilization." Henry's policy was — in operation —
more fair-minded and humane than that of most of the
Tudors, but that was simply because he saw the
costliness and futility of a policy of conquest and
extermination, and his acts in Ireland were less
oppressive than those of the saintly Mary later on. " It
is certain," say the Annals of Loch Ce, "that there
came not in later times a better king than that king."
Translated, this means nothing more than that Henry
was the best of a bad lot. But this honourable mention
in the Irish annals is sufficiently noteworthy to be
mentioned, and to be set against the lurid Bluebeard
we are accustomed to.
CHAPTER XI
SHANE O'NEILL— TO THE CRUSHING OF
THE SUSSEX-O'DONNELL CONFEDERACY
(1551-1561)
The national character of the English has changed
very little during several centuries, but in one respect
there is absolutely no change, in that they retain in its
full force their habit of slandering their enemies. And
the more resistance they meet with in their career of
universal spoliation, the bigger and the more venomous
the slander they throw out. King Theebaw of Burmah,
for instance, got off lightly — he was only set down as a
drunkard — and because of Theebaw's little convivial
habits, his people were deprived of their country; they
offered very little resistance, and hence Theebaw got off
comparatively easily. But in dealing with Shane O'Neill
they exhausted every epithet in their language: glutton,
drunkard, liar, coward, murderer, adulterer, these were
the things they loved to write about him, in impotent
rage against him, for that he beat them in battle, in wit,
in diplomacy, in cunning, in strength and in brains;
feared not their poison nor their treachery; broke down
all their traps; beat all their Deputies. They feared
and they hated him and with cause, for his whole life
was one long struggle againt them, a struggle for the
upbuilding of a strong kingship in Ulster. "My
ancestors," said he to them, "were kings of Ulster, and
Ulster is mine and shall be mine."
When Conn Bacach O'Neill agreed in 1543 to accept
the English title of Earl of Tyrone, he did so without
any authority from his people, and the arrangement, as
all such arrangements at the time, was never operative;
68
SHANE O'NEILL
it merely served as an English interest for interference
in the North. One of the clauses of the indenture
creating Conn Bacach an Earl was that his illegitimate
son, Feardorcha — called by the English Mathew — was
to be his heir and, during his lifetime, was to be known
as the Baron of Dungannon, with certain lands set apart
for his maintenance. This, of course, was settled solely
to break up the O'Neill power by dividing the house
against itself; to give the English a firm footing in the
North by ensuring that, whatever way the leadership
of the O'Neills went, there would always be a Baron 01
Dungannon's section to look for support to the English.
In actual practice, however, this plan proved to be totally
ineffective, and it is an ironical comment on it that it
gave to Ireland Hugh O'Neill, in many ways the ablest
of the Irish chiefs. In 1551 the English thought that,
Conn Bacach being now old, and Feardorcha grown up,
and Shane quite young, it was a good time to attempt to
consolidate Feardorcha in Tireoghain. Accordingly,
we read that "by reason of the war and dissensions
between the Earl of Tyrone and his sons, the country
was reduced to great misery and desolation, in conse-
quence of which Sir James Crofts, Deputy, and the
Council at Ardmaghe, perceiving the Earl not to be
minded to amend these enormities procured that he
should come to Dublin, where by our Council and
assent he was retained, and certain captains and soldiers
have been appointed to remain at Ardmaghe, and in
the other parts of the North, for the greater tranquillity
of the country in the Earl's absence." The English
granted the Baron of Dungannon authority in his father's
absence and, as for Shane, the Deputy was ordered to
catch him if he could "for that we perceive by your
brother that the said Shane O'Neill is a man likest to
follow his father's conditions, and to be a like enemy to
the State, and the weal of our country there." Deputy
Crofts accordingly marched North in 1551 to attack
the MacDonnells of Antrim, who were at this time in
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
alliance with Shane, and the ingenious Cox tells the
result as follows; — "The English invaded the Island of
Raghlin, but were forced to retreat with the loss of one
ship and several men: Captain Bagnal also was taken
prisoner, but he was afterwards exchanged for Sorleyboy
MacDonald, who was their prisoner at Dublin." What
actually happened was that, of the force which Crofts
sent against Raghlin, one man only escaped to tell the
tale, and he was the commanding officer, who was spared
so that he might be exchanged for Sorley Buidhe, who
was then in English hands. This was not a promising
beginning, but in that same year Crofts again marched
North to avenge their defeat, and found himself con-
fronted by the MacDonnells, Shane O'Neill and his
forces, and the forces of the O'Neills of Clann Aodha
Buidhe.
"The Ultonians and Scots," say the Four Masters,
"were prepared to meet them, and after they had
encountered each other, a fierce and desperate battle
ensued, in which the English were defeated, and two
hundred of the Saxons, and of their Irish allies, were
slain, and such of them that escaped returned in disgrace
and discomfiture from that expedition." But Crofts
was a persevering man, and he again marched North in
1552 with a new army, expecting to be joined by
Feardorcha with his army. But again Shane was too
wily. Crofts' advance guard, under one of the Savages,
was met by Hugh O'Neill of Clann Adoha Buidhe and
beaten, Savage himself being slain. Feardorcha and
his forces were attacked at night by Shane himself and
almost exterminated: so back went Crofts to Dublin
with his tail between his legs. He made one further
trial this year, which is not noticed by the English
authorities. The Four Masters give it as follows:—
"The Lord Justice marched with another army into
Ulster in harvest, and only succeeded in destroying the
crops; some of his people were slain, and he returned
without gaining submission or peace." Sir James Crofts
70
SHANE O'NEILL
was then recalled, and Shane was left in undisturbed
possession of Tireoghain. Conn Bacach was tempor-
arily released in 1552 with a view to quieting Shane,
but as Shane still continued at the head of the Clann,
Conn was seized again and taken to Dublin in 1553.
Shane immediately made a swoop upon Dungannon
Castle, and carried away £800 in gold and silver
and all Conn's plate and other valuables. And Lord
Deputy Cusack, as he puts it, "hearing of the same on
Monday, I went to him with such a band of horsemen
and kerne of my friends, and did parle with him, and
perceived nothing in him but pride, stubbornness, and
all bent to do what he could to destroy the poor country."
The ill-bred Shane!
For several years after this he was not further dis-
turbed by the English, and appears, thus early, to
have embarked on his settled policy of making himself
strong in Ulster. He warred against his former allies,
the O'Neills of Clann Aodha Buidhe, and especially
turned his attention to the O'Donnells, from whom he
got his first defeat in battle. The O'Donnells were at
this time also divided. In 1551 Calvagh O'Donnell,
with the aid of some Scots, overran Tirchonaill, and
captured his father, Manus, whom he kept in prison
until the day of his death. The result was that
Calvagh's brother Hugh joined Shane O'Neill, and
they made a great hosting in 1557 against Calvagh.
The son of O'Neill," says the Four Masters, " received
intelligence that the people of Tirchonaill had sent
their cows and cattle herds into the retired parts and
fortresses of the country in their rear. He said that
act should avail them nothing, as whether they tarried
in Leinster or Munster he would pursue them until he
should bring them under his own jurisdiction, so that
henceforth there should rule over Ulster only one
king." Calvagh O'Donnell had only a small army to
oppose to Shane's big army, and he consulted, curiously
enough, his father Manus — whom he held as a prisoner
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
— as to the course he should adopt. Manus was
prompt with his advice, which was not to try to fight
Shane, but to watch an opportunity, and surprise his
camp. This Calvagh did with complete success. He
came on Shane's camp at the hour of the evening meal,
and after an obstinate battle Shane's army was defeated
with heavy slaughter, he himself barely escaping. This
checked for a time his project of making himself
undisputed ruler of Ulster. In the next year, 1558,
Feardorcha, the Baron of Dungannon, was slain in
conflict by some of Shane's men. English writers, of
course, accuse Shane of murdering Feardorcha, but he
was slain in open combat, a combat at which Shane
himself does not appear to have been present, and the
following year, 1559, Conn Bacach died and Shane
was solemnly inaugurated as O'Neill by his people.
With his acknowledgment as O'Neill commences
his career proper, a wonderful career of eight years,
during which he matched his wits against the sharpest
of the Elizabethans and beat them, during which he
marched boldly into the lion's den, and got out of it
again unharmed. He fought the English with their
own weapons, wrote ironical letters in Latin or in
Irish to the Deputies, loftily ignored them when it
suited him, and beat them in diplomacy and in argu-
ment whenever he met them. His policy from the
beginning was clear, to put all Ulster under him and
make a strong kingdom of it and, while so doing, to
disarm English hostility by pretending that all his
work was undertaken " in the Queen's service." After
Ulster would follow the whole of Ireland.
In 1559 Sydney, who was Lord Deputy, summoned
him peremptorily to come to Dundalk and explain why
he had himself inaugurated O'Neill in defiance of
English law, according to which the young Baron of
Dungannon was the rightful heir to Tyrone. Shane
replied blandly, inviting Sydney to come to see him
and become his gossip, and that then, he would come
72
SHANE O'NEILL
and do all that would be requisite for Her Majesty's
service. Sydney went, and he and James Wingfield
stood sponsors for Shane's child. Shane then put his
case to Sydney, and arguing first on Irish law, said that
Conn Bacach's surrender of Tyrone to the crown was
null and void, as he had no power to make any such
surrender, his interest, by the law of Tanistry, being
merely a life interest ; and that therefore he, Shane
O'Neill, being lawfully elected O'Neill by his people,
was the rightful ruler. Coming to English law, he
argued that the letters patent were void, because there
was no inquisition taken before they were passed, nor
had Tyrone been made shire ground, without which no
inquisition could be taken. In any case, argued he,
even if the letters patent were valid, I am my father's
legitimate son, and therefore, his heir according to the
English law. This effectually stumped Sydney. He
could find no reply to make, but to assure Shane that
the matter was one of great moment, and that " he
doubted not but that the Queen would do what was
right and just " ; and that he, therefore, advised him
to a quiet and loyal deportment till her Majesty's
pleasure were known. They parted good friends, and
one can imagine Shane, who must have had a great
sense of humour, watching the departing Sydney,
chuckling to himself with a mirthful gleam in his grey
eyes, and a heavy curse behind it all. Immediately
afterwards he wrote to Elizabeth, telling her, with
delicious irony, that " the rude, uncivil and disobedient
people will fall to civility, and thereafter be faithful,
obedient and true subjects unto God and unto your
Highness. And also, having my requests, I shall be
able to exile your Grace's enymyes, subdue traytours,
overcome rebells, and such as will disobeye."
Sir Henry Sydney was now recalled, and the Earl
of Sussex was sent over instead. Elizabeth's instruc-
tions to him concerning Shane are, " We are informed
that Shane O'Neill, the eldest son legitimate of the
73
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Earl of Tyrone, now lately deceased, makes claim to
succeed his father as his heir, and personally occupies
and possesses all that country, rule, and lands, which
his father enjoyed without let or interruption of any
person. Notwithstanding that the son and heir of the
Baron of Dungannon, which was the bastard son of
the Earl of Tyrone, was entitled to succeed his said
father as his heir, we think most meet, especially for
the preferment of the person legitimate in blood, and
next for that he is thereof in quiet possession, that the
Deputy should allow him to succeed his father." But
the next year Elizabeth authorized Sussex to " practice
with such other subjects as be neighbours unto him,
by reward or otherwise, by whom we may most
probably reform the said Shane, or otherwise by our
force to compel him to stand by your order and
goverance." Sussex, however, found Shane too strong
to attack and, instead, tried to induce him to go to
London and state his case to the Queen. Shane
expressed himself as perfectly willing, wrote to the
Queen desiring an " English gentlewoman of noble blood
to wife," and asked for a safe conduct. He got his safe
conduct and then, in April 1561, he wrote that he could
not come without the loan of £3,000." This did not
at all suit Elizabeth, who wrote to Sussex in May,
" We are prepared to spare no charge to scourge and
subdue him and his complices to very extremity. . . .
For the better exploit hereof you shall do well, before
this your enterprise, to solicit and provoke James
Mac O'Neill (James MacDonnell), or his brother
Sorleboy, to make war upon the said Shane at the
same time that you shall determine your attempt ;
and the like you shall seek to be done by O'Donnell
and his followers, and by all others as well the friends
and followers of the young Baron of Dungannon as
what others soever you shall think meet." Sussex,
acting accordingly, soon had a formidable league
against Shane. Calvagh O'Donnell, on a promise of
74
SHANE O'NEILL
being made Earl of Tirconnell, agreed to attack
Shane from the north-west ; the Scottish MacDonnells,
who were kin to Calvagh's wife, the Countess of Argyle,
were to attack from the east; O'Reilly of Breffni, from
the west, on promise also of an Earldom — and Sussex
himself and the Earl of Kildare, from the south. But
Shane proved more than a match for Sussex. He
came down upon Breffni suddenly, easily overcame
any resistance, and forced O'Reilly to give hostages
for his good behaviour; and then as suddenly entered
Tirchonaill and captured and carried off Calvagh
O'Donnell and his wife, generally known as the
Countess of. Argyle. The lady, who is described in
the state papers as " very sober, wise, and no less
subtle, being not unlearned in the Latin tongue,
speaketh good French, and as is said some little
Italian," remained with Shane, apparently of her own
free will, until his death, Calvagh being ransomed by
his own people. The morality of this arrangement is
a matter which, I think, need not distress us, as it did
not distress contemporary opinion. The MacDonnells,
who were the lady's kinsrpen, immediately detached
themselves from the League against Shane, and the
Four Masters in referring to it say merely " O'Neill
after that gave Calvagh a direful and merciless
imprisonment, and cohabited with Mac Gilleain's
daughter until she brought forth children to him, and
if that had not been a temporary respite for the Tir-
conallians, it was an unhappy circumstance for the
Irish, to have been deprived of their chief after that
manner." And a little later there is an entry, " Mary,
the daughter of Calvagh O'Donnell — who was Shane
O'Neill's wife — died of indignation, disgust, grief, and
dire afflictions for the cruel and heartless incarceration
inflicted by O'Neill on Calvagh, her father, in her
presence." The moral indignation at Shane's conduct
with regard to the Countess of Argyle is of purely
modern growth, so far as it has been indulged in by
75
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Irish writers ; the incident doesn't appear to have made
any difference to Shane's contemporaries. The lady,
as far as can be judged by the scanty references to her
which are available, seems to have been a fit mate for
him, accomplished and high-spirited, constantly helping
and urging him to keep his principality secure from all
invaders. But at any rate, whether Shane's object in
this was personal or political, it was a master stroke of
political genius, for it broke up the League built by
Sussex, and left him to bear the brunt of the fighting.
He came into Tyrone with a large army, and Shane
retired to his hills, keeping a watchful eye on him.
Sussex made a big camp at Armagh, and thence sent
out a force of one thousand men to plunder the country.
Shane let them alone to their plunder ; then when they
had as much booty as they thought they could carry,
he came down on them heavily. Sussex himself wails
the result as follows : — " Never before durst Scot or
Irishman look an Englishman in the face in plains or
wood since I was here, and now Shane, in a plain three
miles away from any wood, and where I would have
asked of God to have had him, hath with one hundred
and twenty horse and a few Scots and Gallowglass,
scarce half its numbers, charged our whole army ; and
by the cowardice of one wretch, whom I held dear to
me as my own brother (James Wingfield), was like in
one hour to have left not one man of that army alive,
and after to have taken me and the rest at Armagh.
The fame of the English army — so hardly gotten — is
now vanished, and I wrecked and dishonoured by other
men's deeds." Needless to say all the plunder was
restored to its rightful owners. And the Four Masters
continue : " O'Neill, i.e., John, assured the supreme
government of the entire province of Ulster, from
Drogheda to the River Erne, so that it was not an
inappropriate title to call him Coigheadach — (the ruler
of a province) — over Ulster at that time, were it not
for the contest carried on against him by the English."
76
CHAPTER XII
SHANE O'NEILL— THE VISIT TO ELIZABETH
AND THE TREATY OF BEINN BORB (1562-3)
All this time, while Shane was fighting and plotting
against Sussex and against the English, he continued
nominally on friendly terms — even when he knew of the
confederacy with the O'Donnells and MacDonnells.
He refused to acknowledge Sussex as his equal, and
desired that his letters be sent directly to Elizabeth as
one sovereign to another, and he worried him continually
about his journey to London to see Elizabeth, professing
his readiness to go if he were provided with the necessary
money. Here is a short summary of the correspondence :
— On June 9, 1561, Shane wrote to Sussex enquiring
whether the money for his journey to England had yet
come, and Sussex replied that he would not withdraw
his soldiers from Armagh, and that if Shane " will repair
to the Queen's presence he must come quickly to him"
(Sussex). Shane replied stating that nothing hindered
his repair to the Queen's presence but lack of money;
and in July he again wrote requesting Sussex to for-
ward his messenger and his letters to the Queen.
Sussex replied that if he did not immediately do
according to Her Majesty's directions he would be pro-
claimed a traitor; to which Shane replied that he
"wondered that His Lordship would put the Queen to
unnecessary expense in waging war" against him; that
he would ask no peace or truce while the soldiers
remained at Armagh; and desired that his messenger
and letters might be forwarded to the Queen's presence.
And a little later he writes again stating that he has
learned that His Lordship does not desire to send him
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
or his messenger to the presence of the Queen ; and that
he "will not come unto His Lordship's presence until
he has seen the Queen." Then in July happened the
battle in which he so severely defeated Sussex, and on
August g he wrote to Sussex "desiring His Lordship's
sister to wife," and that His Lordship would be his
gossip. The irony of all this is inimitable ; Shane first
playing with the hapless Deputy about his letters and
messengers to the Queen, then he beats Sussex badly in
battle, and winds up by a bland note desiring His
Lordship's sister to wife, as if nothing had happened.
Beaten in battle and in brains, Sussex turned to the
unfailing English alternative — assassination, and pro-
posed to Neale Gray, Shane's seneschal, to kill him.
"In fine," wrote Sussex to Elizabeth, "I brake with
him to kill Shane, and bound myself by my oath to let
him have a hundred marks of land. ... I told him
the way he might do it, and how to escape after with
safety. . . . If he will not do that he may in your
service, there will be done to him what others may."
And Elizabeth, of course, approved of it, but it failed,
for Neale Grey grew afraid and backed out. Immedi-
ately afterwards — all attempts, fair and foul, having
failed to put Shane down — Elizabeth instructed Sussex
that he was to be drawn to come to London : was to
be given pledges for his safe conduct, and money for
the journey, and at last, there being no help for it, he
made an agreement with Shane. It was agreed that
Shane was to have a safe conduct, that he and his
should go and come safely, that none of his people
should be hurt while he was away, and that he should
have the Earl of Kildare's surety — the Earl was his
cousin — that the soldiers at Armagh should not hurt
him the value of a groat, and should be withdrawn thence
as soon as he met the Earls of Kildare and Ormond at
Carrickbradagh, and that no Irishman that owed him
allegiance should be maintained against him. He got
his own terms absolutely, Sussex being only too glad
78
SHANE O'NEILL
to get him out of Ireland at any price. Writing to the
Sueen, Sussex says, "The suspending any conclusion
id been most perilous of all others, for that in that
time Shane should have had opportunity to seek upon
such as served your Highness, and thereby increased
his strength. The Earl's protection, which you might
wish to be stayed, is most earnestly of him affected, as
without the which he will not go — and one other indirect
advantage lieth also hidden to be taken upon the strict-
ness of the agreement (which, with such a traitor might
very well be allowed) in that the Earl of Kildare was
put as surety for the fetching away of the soldiers from
Armagh, and no word forbidding others to be at any
time brought thither," and in November Cecil writes,
"that in Shane's absence from Ireland something might
be contrived at against him and his for non-observing
the covenants on his side, and so the fact being infringed
the matter might be used as should be thought fit."
Shane's visit to London was perhaps the most remark-
able of his feats, and shows more than anything else
the genius and capacity of the man. He had examples
in plenty of Irishmen who had put themselves into
English hands and never came out of them, but he
chose to play the bold game and to match his wits
against those of Elizabeth and Cecil, and out of that
trap where Sussex thought he had him fast he marched
a free man again, desiring, in his humorous way, "his
Lordship's sister to wife." He humbugged Elizabeth
as easily and as consistently as he humbugged Sussex
and Sydney. He refused to move a step until he had
his safe conduct and his £3,000, and then, accompanied
by his guard of gallowglasses, went leisurely to Dublin,
and thence to London. He came into Elizabeth's
presence boldly and proudly and manfully, one sovereign
to another. Froude, basing his narrative on Camden,
thus described the meeting: — "Elizabeth, her entire
court and the foreign ambassadors being present in the
Council Chamber, O'Neill stalked in, his saffron mantle
79
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
sweeping round and round him, his hair curling on his
back and clipped short below the eyes, which gleamed
under it with a grey lustre. Behind him followed his
gallowglasses, bareheaded and fair-haired, with shirts of
mail which reached their knees, a wolfskin flung across
their shoulders, and short, broad battle-axes in their
hands." Whether he submitted to Elizabeth or not is
a moot question. He certainly never submitted in the
ordinary meaning of the term, though he may have
accepted Elizabeth's suzerainty and grinned in his
sleeve all the time, for that was a part of the game he
was playing, to give the English no pretext to attack
him which he could obviate by any kind of pretence at
submission, or by any promises of good behaviour.
The Four Masters merely say, " O'Neill went to England
about the ist of November to visit the Queen, and he
received great honour and respect from her, and he
returned home in the May of the following year."
Having got Shane to London, Elizabeth's ministers
sought to keep him there and, upon Shane presenting
his terms, viz., he to be acknowledged hereditary ruler
of Ulster, and to enjoy all the rights and privileges of
his forefathers, but accepting Elizabeth's suzerainty,
they neither accepted nor refused, thereupon he
demanded his safe conduct home, and was answered
that although the agreement gave him a safe conduct it did
not specify when it was to be given, and that it would be
given at the Queen's pleasure. Here came out the trick in
the whole business, exactly similar to the trick about
the garrison at Armagh. No stipulation was made
about sending soldiers again to Armagh, so that the
English would fulfil the agreement by merely taking
out the garrison and sending it back again ; and here
in the matter of the safe conduct, Shane found that he
had been trapped after all, and was a prisoner for as
long as Elizabeth liked to keep him. Had he been a
lesser man than he was he would have grovelled and
humbled himself, and besought Elizabeth's ministers to
So
SHANE O'NEILL
intercede for him, and do all the other things which the
English love to see their enemies do; but this greatest
of the O'Neills was of a different mettle. He went about
with the haughtiest and proudest bearing, unconcerned
and cheerful, held his own with the whole court, and
carried on the game of bluff which he practised in Ire-
land by refusing to approach Elizabeth otherwise than
direct. He was offered by the Privy Council a choice
of two courses, either to sign certain articles drawn up
by Cecil — which included his giving up of Tireoghain
to become shireland, his dressing like an Englishman,
and other things of the like nature — or to await the
arrival of the Baron of Dungannon who had been sent
for. Instead of answering the Council Shane wrote
direct to the Queen, asking " Her Majesty's advice as to
what was best for him to do," begged her to choose a
gentlewoman for his wife; that in the meantine he
should be allowed to go with Lord Robert Dudley and
learn to ride in the English fashion; declared that he
had no refuge or succour save Her Majesty; and finally,
"I want," said Shane, "to borrow more money," and,
more singular still, he got the money, ^300, by
warrant from Elizabeth herself to the Receiver General
of the Court of Wards, in May 1562. Meanwhile the
Council had written the Deputy on the I3th March to
have the Baron of Dungannon sent over, and on the
28th March, they wrote to him privately, asking that
the Baron should be stayed from coming. This was
true English diplomacy, but the Baron was effectually
stayed from coming in a manner not pleasing to them,
for the Tanist of Tireoghain, Torlogh Luineach O'Neill,
slew him on the I2th April, and Shane, one imagines,
smiled grimly when the news reached London, and
Cecil and Walsingham began to wonder whether it was
his doing, and whether they were really a match for
this Irishman. There is no positive evidence of it, so
far as I know, but it looks as if Torlogh had orders to
make himself as nasty as possible just at this time, for
G 81
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
immediately afterwards Sir Nicholas Bagenal writes
mournfully to Cecil that Shane's followers have greatly
spoiled his lands and tenants; and desiring to exchange
them for English lands. This was on April 23, and
on May 5 Elizabeth gave way and made an indenture
with Shane. He was recognized as O'Neill, as ruler of
Ulster, was authorized to expel the Scots, and to subdue
all the Queen's enemies; was not to make war without
the consent of the Council. He left London imme-
diately, passed through Dublin quickly, and on to
Tireoghain, where he was received with acclamation by
his clansmen; and then proceeded to play the usual
game of bluff, with the enlarged opportunity given him
by the necessity for the conclusion of a definite treaty
between him and the Queen's Commissioners on the
lines laid down in her agreement with him in May.
The correspondence respecting this proposed treaty is
is as highly amusing as any of Shane's previous
correspondence.
Shane's policy, clearly and definitely marked in all
his moves, was to make himself king of Ulster, and
consolidate under himself all the Irish chiefs. That
was why he was eternally at war with the O'Donnells
and the Maguires, and why he warred also with the
Scots of Antrim. Some chieftains have warred largely
for the sake of warfare, and others from the necessity
of defending their patrimony. Shane did it with a
deliberate statesmanlike object in view, the building
up of a strong kingdom in Ulster. He was no mere
conqueror or freebooter, but a brave and wise ruler,
who ruled justly and fearlessly, and under his jurisdic-
tion Ulster became the wealthiest and happiest part
of Ireland. And England's policy is no less clear.
In a report which Sussex made shortly after Shane's
return in 1562, he says, " It will be necessary to expel
Shane O'Neill out of Tyrone, who usurps all rights
belonging to the Crown and the Earldom of Ulster,
and by spoil and ravine keeps the most part of the
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SHANE O'NEILL
Irishry of Ulster under his subjection and in rebellion
against the Queen. He molests all others that
acknowledge their duties to her and seeks to join with
the Scots, and to procure aid out of Scotland." Sussex
goes on to enumerate the various divisions of Ulster,
with the clans and their strength, and continues by
advising that Her Majesty " should not only tolerate
with the Scots of James MacConnell's sept now in
Ireland, but should also gratify them in their requests."
This, argued Sussex, will divide them from the
Northern Irish, and it will then facilitate the Queen
in the accomplishment of her principle object — (the
putting down of Shane O'Neill) — and this done, said
he, they may easily also be expelled out of the kingdom.
So that it was the old policy, to incite the MacDonnells
and the O'Donnells, Maguires and O'Reillys to fight
Shane, with the English looking on while they fought,
and Shane, who saw the whole game, was quite content
to take it on on those terms. Once let him get a
strong united Ulster, and he feared not the English,
nor did he fear at any time to match his wits or his
strength with theirs. Immediately after his return to
Ulster, he gathered his forces and marched against
Calvagh O'Donnell, who had definitely allied himself
with the English, and against Maguire of Fer-
managh, beat them both and expelled Maguire.
This was, of course, against the terms of his
agreement with the Queen. Instead of waiting for
Sussex to complain to her about this, Shane wrote
demanding the withdrawal of the garrison from Armagh,
and once again informing Sussex that he " desired his
Lordship's sister to wife." Some writers take this oft-
repeated request of Shane's seriously, but to me it is a
huge joke on Sussex. Shane always made it when he
had been particularly busy, either defeating the English
or some of their allies, and one can imagine him
grinning at the thought of Sussex's face when he read
it. Sussex, at any rate, laid a trap for Shane, and
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
invited him to a conference to Dundalk, sending him
a safe conduct, which was so worded as to give an
opportunity of arresting him. The wily Shane said all
right, he'd be there, and when the day dawned Sussex
and his party cooled their heels waiting, but no Shane.
Thereupon they wrote to him expressing sorrow at his
refusal to meet them; and Shane, instead of answering
them and excusing himself, as they probably expected,
wrote direct to Elizabeth and complained that some
of his people had been robbed and spoiled, and some
killed during his absence, despite her protection ; that
Sussex had waged war against him, and that as he
understood it was not Her Majesty's will to deal so
sharply with him he promised to observe his faithfulness
towards her. The next year, 1563, he overran some of
the minor chiefs of Ulster who were drawn into the
English conspiracy, and then turned southward,
carrying his arms up to the wall of Dublin without
being fought with save at Dundalk, which he attempted
to take but failed in ; and in September he put the
Council on tenterhooks of suspense by writing in to
them and offering peace on his own terms, he to be
recognized ruler of Ulster, malefactors not to be
sheltered in the English Pale, and he added in the
usual joke about the Lady Frances, Sussex's sister.
He also wrote to Elizabeth professing his willingness
to serve her faithfully, and adding that he could not
omit the statutes and ordinances of his predecessors,
as neither he nor his subjects were skilled in the
Queen's. Sussex this year made another attempt at
Ulster, but Shane kept out of the way, and Sussex,
with no provisions and no money, was forced to return
with a mutinous army and nothing accomplished.
After this there was nothing to do but to make peace
on Shane's terms ; he was master of the situation, and
on the nth September, 1563, the Treaty of Benburb
was agreed upon. Shane was recognized as O'Neill,
was to be ruler of Ulster, and have all the powers and
SHANE O'NEILL
privileges enjoyed by his ancestors, and was not bound
to come in person to the summons of any Deputy.
There were no stipulations about English customs, or
about making Tireoghain shireland, or anything of that
nature ; in short, the Treaty was virtually a recognition
of Shane as King of Ulster, with Elizabeth's nominal
suzerainty. The garrison was to be removed from
Armagh, and any spoil taken from his people while he
was in England was to be restored to him. Elizabeth
confirmed the Treaty, and immediately afterwards
Sussex had another try at assassination. Harmony
being apparently restored he sent one John Smith
from Dublin with a present of wine to Shane. The
wine was poisoned, but it just failed of the intended
effect, and Shane and his household, though they
were brought to death's door, eventually recovered.
Elizabeth's letter expressing horror at this treachery
is very amusing reading.
CHAPTER XIII
SHANE O'NEILL— THE ATTEMPTED CON-
SOLIDATION OF ULSTER (1564-1567)
Shane, having made his treaty with England, and
being free from attack from that quarter for the time
being, now turned his attention to consolidating Ulster.
He had recognized the futility, in the then condition of
Ireland, with England always ready to sow dissension,
of any confederacy on a voluntary basis, and was deter-
mined to force, if necessary, the other Ulster chiefs to
accept him as king. His only rivals in the North were,
of course, the O'Donriells and the MacDonnells, and he
moved against them quickly. Manus O'Donnell had
died, and Shane's old enemy, Calvagh, was now
O'Donnell, and friendly with the English, supported by
his son Conn, who is described in the State Papers as
"the likeliest plant that ever sprang in Ulster to graft
a good subject on." In 1564 Shane invaded Tir
Chonaill, routed Conn's army, captured Conn himself,
and took possession of some of the O'Donnell castles.
And then he turned his attention to the MacDonnells
of Antrim. The MacDonnells, or Redshanks from the
Isles, had filtered over to Antrim at first owing to
hereditary associations, many of their kings having
intermarried with Ulster families, and later as the result
of internal warfare, until at this time they practically
held Antrim. In general policy and behaviour they
were exactly like any Irish clan, except that their
numbers were inexhaustible so long as the kingdom of
the Isles continued. In proceeding against them Shane
was merely adopting the policy which he adopted
towards the O'Donnells and the Maguires and the other
86
SHANE O'NEILL
Irish clans, but he told Elizabeth he was doing it in
her service, tried to get money to assist him — which she
would not give, as she thought he was becoming too
powerful — and he made insistent efforts to get possession
of Cnockfergus — Carrickfergus — which was then gar-
risoned in the English interest. The MacDonnells
were at the time led by four brothers, Angus, James,
Sorley Buidhe, and Alexander Og, and Shane came
upon them at a time when Angus, James and Alexander
were in Cantire with their own people. He crossed the
Bann suddenly, and, after a few minor conflicts, beat
Sorley Buidhe near Cushendun, Sorley retiring towards
Ballycastle — which was their stronghold — and at Bally-
castle he was met by his brothers James and Angus,
who had hurried with help from Scotland on hearing of
Shane's invasion. But Shane, with his army of 2,000,
had followed hard on Sorley's heels, and the MacDonnell
brethren were forced to fight him with the odds two to
one against them. The result was a decisive victory for
Shane, seven hundred Scots out of one thousand being
slain, including Angus, and the other two brothers,
James and Sorley Buidhe being taken prisoners. James
was badly wounded and died soon afterwards of morti-
fication of his wounds. The younger brother, Alexander
Og, remained in Scotland, biding his time, on hearing
of the disastrous battle of Gleanntaisi; and Shane
possessed himself undisturbed of Antrim. He wrote an
account to the Lord Justice of this expedition, gravely
assuring him that it was undertaken on Her Majesty's
account. But although he told Elizabeth that, "by
God's mercy, Antrim was now reduced to her obedience,"
the Deputy writes in alarm that Shane had put a ward
of his own into the castles of Newry and Dundrum, and
that he was likely to get more into his possession than
Her Majesty would think meet. Immediately after-
wards, Ulster being apparently secure, he marched into
Connacht, into Clanricarde's country, and exacted
tribute which was formerly payable to the Ulster kings;
'"
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
and meanwhile he did not forget his game of bluff,
writing to Elizabeth in October asking to be invested
Earl of Tyrone, to get the town of Belgriffin in the
English Pale as a residence, to be allowed his expenses
of living in the Pale when he came up to Parliament,
and lastly, asking for aid against the Scots. Sussex was
now recalled in disgrace, having failed all along the line,
and Sir Henry Sydney was sent over in his stead. Sir
Henry made overtures to Shane for a conference at
Dundalk, which Shane played with in his usual fashion,
sending in a long statement which he headed, " The
causes and matters moving my people not to suffer me
to come to the Lord Deputy's presence with such expe-
dition as his Lordship requireth, with what happened
within this twenty years, and in the memory of the
same O'Neill, the harm done by the Governors and
others here within the realm of Ireland." Then followed
an account, written with the greatest irony, of the
dealings of the English with Conn Bacach, and with
Shane himself, with special reference to the treachery
of Sussex and the attempts at assassination. Then he
enumerated the chief treacheries performed by the
English against other Irish chiefs; and he concluded:
"and allbeit I stand assured of your Honour's lawful
and most assured friendship, being most assured of your
Lordship's good affection, and the most humble of that
honourable Council, yet my people are timorous and
mistrustful of the former proceeding." Sydney had no
answer to make to this and, a few days later, Sir Nicholas
Bagenal complains that he never knew the country so
out of order, "Shane O'Neill has now all the countries
from Sligo to Carrickfergus and from thence to Car-
lingford, and from Carlingford to Drogheda," and in
March Sydney himself says that the English Pale is
spoiled daily and in utter poverty, and that Shane
O'Neill is the only strong and rich man in Ireland, and
is able to burn and spoil to Dublin's gates and go away
unfought. In March Cecil writes to Sydney that they
88
SHANE O'NEILL
are all bent on the extirpation of that proud rebel,
Shane O'Neill, and Elizabeth instructed him " to employ
his whole care and consideration how O'Neill, who has
now manifested himself so contemptuous a traitor, may
be utterly extirpated." And Sydney can only reply
that O'Neill will be tyrant of all Ireland; has won the
rest of O'Donnell's castles, confederated with the Scots,
is in Maguire's country, will spend the summer in Con-
nacht and next winter in the English Pale. Shane, on
his side, wrote in April to Charles IX of France, and to
the Cardinal of Lorraine for help to drive the English
out of Ireland, and this year was exceedingly active.
He burned the cathedral of Armagh so that the English
could not take refuge there again, and overran the Pale
without opposition, save again at Dundalk, which he
made an unsuccessful attempt to capture. And in
September he wrote to John of Desmond, pointing out
that the English "had no other view but to subdue
both the English and the Irish Pale," and urging that
they should combine and drive them out ; that " now
was the time, now or never." Shane was the first man
in Irish history to see that England oppressed her
own colonists equally with the Irish people; but John
of Desmond did not respond. Sydney at this time
puts Shane's fighting strength at 4,000 foot and 700
horse. He was now at the height of his power,
absolute ruler of Ulster, with every prospect and
apparently a definite intention, of extending himself into
Leinster and Connacht. "I care not to be made an
Earl," said he to Commissioners Stuckeley and Dowdall,
"unless I may be better and higher than an Earl; for
I am in blood and power better than the best of them ;
and I will give place to none but my cousin of Kildare,
for that he is of my house. You have made a wise
Earl of McCarthy Mor ; I keep as good a man as he.
For the Queen, I confess she is my sovereign ; but I
never made peace with her but at her own seeking.
Whom am I to trust ? When I came unto the Earl of
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Sussex upon safe conduct, he offered the courtesy of a
handlock. When I was with the Queen, she said to
me herself that I had, it was true, safe conduct to come
and go ; but it was not said when I might go ; and they
kept me there until I had agreed to things so far
against my honour and profit, that I would never
perform them while I live. That made me make war ;
and if it were to do again I would do it. My ancestors
were kings of Ulster; and Ulster is mine and shall be
mine. O'Donnell shall never come unto his country,
nor Bagenall into Newry, nor Kildare into Dundrum
or Lecale. They are now mine. With the sword I
won them ; with the sword I shall keep them."
And just now, when Shane was apparently quite
secure and more formidable than ever, the end came
with appalling suddenness. Sydney was reinforced in
1566 by one thousand men from England, and
garrisoned Derry with seven hundred men, under
Colonel Randolph. Shane immediately besieged it,
and Randolph sallying forth, a battle was fought under
its walls. The English accounts are to the effect that
four hundred Irish were slain and only one on the
English side, viz., Colonel Randolph himself, but that
the magazine and fort of Derry blew up shortly after-
wards, and that the garrison was forced to evacuate the
town. But in the Spanish State Papers on English
affairs, preserved at Simaneas, in which there is an
occasional reference to Irish affairs, there is a reference
to the killing of Randolph and to the report as to the
slaying of four hundred Irish. The Spanish ambassador
in his letter to King Philip, says : — " This is not true,
according to people who have come from there, but
that several died on both sides, O'Neill not losing more
than forty men," and in a further letter, on the
8th March, he states, " Preparations are being made
for Ireland, as John O'Neill's people have treated badly
the troops who were sent from here."
The attempt to hold Derry having failed him, Sydney
90
SHANE O'NEILL
had recourse to the old plan of inciting the other
Northern chiefs to attack Shane. Calvagh O'Donnell
died at this time, and was succeed by his brother Hugh,
the same Hugh who had been Shane's ally against
Calvagh some years before, but who now, incited by
Sydney, turned against him and fought for full authority
over Tir Chonaill. Sydney at the same time caused
some other chiefs to break away from Shane, by
promising them full power over their own territories;
and he also sought to stir up the Scots by reminding
them of their defeat at Gleanntaisi by Shane, and of
the death of James MacDonnell, their best loved leader.
In the winter of 1566 O'Donnell crossed into Tireoghain
and took a prey there, and Shane, in retaliation, crossed
the Swilly in the spring of 1567 with a large army.
Hugh O'Donnell could only muster four hundred men,
but he attacked Shane's big army in sheer desperation
and utterly routed it after an astonishing battle ; 1,300
of Shane's army were either slain or drowned in
attempting to cross into Tireoghain, he himself barely
escaping with his life. " As to O'Neill," say the Four
Masters, " he escaped from that battle, and he would
have preferred that he had not, for his mind and faculties
were affected ever after it." Unless something of the
kind happened it is difficult to account for the crushing
result of this battle. Ten years previously, when Shane
was defeated by Hugh's brother, Calvagh, the victory
was quite as decisive, but it did not materially affect
Shane's position, whereas this battle seems to have
made him a fugutive, and his whole power fell to pieces
in a few hours. He came to the desperate resolution
of trusting himself to the Scots, having first released
Sorley Buidhe, who had been a prisoner for two years,
and he accordingly came to their camp to a banquet
in Cushendun on the 22nd June, 1567. An altercation,
deliberately provoked, was started by the Scots, and
under cover of it they killed Shane. " The reception
he got from them," say the Four Masters, " was
9*
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
suddenly to attack him and instantly cleave him with
their swords, so that they left him dead on the spot.
The race of Eoghan, son of Niall, much lamented the
death of him who was there slain, for that O'Neill,
namely John, was their Conchubhar, as a provincial king,
their Lughaidh of the Long Hand in valour, their
champion in chivalry and bravery." It is now
known that Shane's assassination was deliberately and
treacherously planned by the MacDonnells, partly in
revenge for Shane's crushing defeats of them in 1565,
and partly by arrangement with Sydney and Captain
Piers, the governor of Cnocfergus. Sydney, writing to
the Queen, says : " I am informed he (Shane) offered
to them of Kintire all Clandeboy, all the gold kine of
his country, also to deliver up Sorlebye and give
them pledge and assurance for his fidelity towards
them. But I, fearing this beforehand, have so temporized
with the Captain of Kintire, Sar ley's brother, that they
have utterly refused his requests." And Piers dug up
Shane's body, after it had been four days buried, cut
off the head, which he sent to Dublin Castle, and got
the reward of one thousand marks which had been
offered.
English writers of Irish history, and Irish writers
deriving their facts from them, have exhausted their
vocabularies to find epithets for Shane O'Neill, and it
is only within comparatively recent times that he is
receiving anything like justice. When he was killed
in 1567 the English uttered one universal sigh of relief,
and the State Papers despatches are full of exultations
and congratulations, and immediately the slanders
began, for Shane had run them too close, had put too
much fear on them, and expressed too much contempt
for them, for them to do him any justice. Yet, apart
altogether from the testimony of the Irish annals as to
his character and ability, there is ample testimony in
English records. Campion, writing in 1571, writes of
Shane that " he ordered the North so properly, that if
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SHANE O'NEILL
any subject could approve the loss of money or goods
within his precinct, he would assuredly either force the
robber to restitution, or of his owne cost redeeme the
harme to the loosers contentation. Sitting at meate,
before he put one morsell into his mouth, he used to
slice a portion above the dayly almes, and send it
namely to some beggars at his gate, saying, it was
meete to serve Christ first." And the following
interesting extracts are from the Carew manuscript,
known as the Book of Howth, a book which was written
by some unknown Englishman, who regarded the Irish
as wonderful barbarians. " This O'Neile was of such
policy and strength as his like was not a long time
afore in his room. . . . This O'Neile made very good
cheer upon the Queen's charges all the while that he
was in England. This O'Neile was a prudent, wise
captain, and a good giver of onset or charge upon his
enemies during the time of his reign, and was given
from fourteen years of age till the day of his death,
always in the wars. . . . Proud he was, and arrogant,
for he thought that no man ought of right to be his
superior or seem his eqall. He had great policy in the
wars, that he was practised with, no man more in his
time. He was a great surfeiter, a great spender, and
cruel and extreme in all his affairs, no man his like,
and liberal in nothing but in housekeeping ; a courteous,
loving, and good companion to those whom he loved,
being strangers to his country. . . . This John
O'Neile, which I spoke of before, did enter many
times in the English Pale in several places, and had
under his rule from the gates of Carlingford and
Dundalke all the North beside to Sligaghe, saving
Carrickfergus, that was well kept. As obedient was all
that to O'Neile this time as the English Pale to the
Deputy." The sum and substance of Shane's crime
was that he fought the English by any means to his
hands his whole life through, and because he beat them
in war and in diplomacy they feared and hated him, and
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
blackened his character. They called him murderer,
but he slew no man in cold blood save proved traitors,
his alleged brother, Feardorcha, was slain in open fight;
they called him liar because he played their own game
against them, and paid as little regard to his promises
as they did to theirs; they called him drunkard and
surfeiter, but it was not a drunkard who beat one after
another of Elizabeth's generals, who sent them reeling
back from Ulster time and again; it was not a
drunkard who matched his wits against Cecil and
Walsingham and won, who held his own at Elizabeth's
court ; they called him ignorant because he disdained
the use of English, would not twist his mouth with
such a barbarous tongue, and wrote his letters in Latin
or in Irish ; they called him a coward for no reason
but that no possible charge against him might be
omitted, but it was no coward who led the O'Neills for
sixteen years and overran all Ulster and threatened
the Pale ; they called him adulterer for a reason which
has been already discussed. But the mists of ignorance
are clearing away from Shane, as from many another
prominent figure in our history, and we can see him at
last as he really was, the foremost Irishman of his time,
and one of the greatest of the Irish chiefs. From the
beginning of his career he had no illusions about the
English, he saw through their game, and all his life he
hated them. He hanged one of his soldiers once for
having English biscuit upon him, and he built a castle
on Lough Neagh, which he called Fuadh na nGaill or
Hate of the English. He ridiculed their language, and
their dress, and their customs, and as for brains, he
was more than a match for the best of them. He was
only beaten in battle twice, and on each occasion by
the O'Donnells, and he routed every English army
that came into Ulster in his time. In diplomacy
he was never beaten, either by England's Deputies or
by Cecil or Walsingham or by Elizabeth herself. He
saw the fatal weakness of the clan system, and he
94
SHANE O'NEILL
warred against that constantly ; he saw that England
kept her grip of Ireland through the clan system, and
he fought to end it by conquering all the other Ulster
chiefs and erecting in Ulster a strong kingdom. His
continual battles against the O'Donnells, and Maguires,
and O'Reillys were justified by the end he had in view,
and all contemporary historians testify to the excellence
of his rule. Under his strong arm in Ulster, husbandry
and industry flourished, and the inhabitants, not
groaning under exactions like the English Pale or
Connacht under Clanricarde, or Munster under the
Desmonds, became the happiest and wealthiest in
Ireland. As Shane sarcastically reminded Elizabeth
in one of his letters, inhabitants of the Pale fled out of
it to settle in Ulster under his protecting arm, and he
ruled strictly and with even-handed justice. No
robbery, or theft, or crime was allowed to go
unpunished where the Red Hand held sway, and
Sydney, when he went through Ulster after Shane's
death, testified his astonishment at its wealth, and
orderliness and populousness. His policy towards
his contemporary fellow-chiefs was dictated by his
own statesmanlike mind, which worked for a strong
authority which should sweep away civil dissensions.
And his policy towards the English was simply to keep
them from interfering in Ulster until he had it in his
own hands. That was why he made his journey to
London, for he thought that if he could make a direct
treaty with Elizabeth he could hold Ulster nominally
from her, and independently of any Lord Deputy, and
thus prevent any Deputy from interfering with him.
And when he thought himself able, he extended himself
into Connacht and Leinster, and would gradually have
tried to put all Ireland under him. The Earl of Sussex,
beaten by him in battle and in diplomacy, tried to ass-
assinate him twice, but failed. The third attempt by
Sir Henry Sydney was more successful, and by the aid
of Captain Piers of Cnocfergus and of the MacDonnels,
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
the dreaded and hated Shane was assassinated at a
friendly banquet, and his head sent to Dublin Castle.
It was a fitting end to the whole English policy towards
Shane. An TMom^if he was called, Shane the Proud,
and his pride hurt the English more than anything,
for he despised them and never fawned on them, or
parleyed with them as other chiefs did. His attitude
was always as his signature ttlir-e O'Neill — I am
O'Neill, and there was no prouder title, and none that
he would exchange it for. His death in his prime, at
the early age of thirty-five, was an irreparable loss to
Ireland.
CHAPTER XIV
JAMES FITZMAURICE AND THE SECOND
GERALDINE LEAGUE (1567-1579)
Sir Henry Sydney bears an honoured name in English
history, but in Ireland his proceedings were as unscru-
pulous and as bloody as those of the most ignoble
adventurer of them all. He was one of the " thorough "
men, believing in extermination and confiscation,
believing in pacification by massacre, and acting up to
his belief; not as thoroughly as Carew afterwards,
perhaps, but sufficiently so, hanging, for the sole pur-
pose of pacification by terror, old men and sick men,
and in one case a blind man. His journeys through
Ireland as Deputy could be traced by corpses, and his
the hand which directed, if it did not originate, the
campaign which ended with the confiscation and
plantation of the broad Desmond acres in Munster, and
the elimination of the Munster Geraldines as an effective
force.
The death of Shane O'Neill was an immense relief
to the Government, but it did not advantage them to
any extent in Ulster. Shane's Tanist, Torlogh Luineach,
was inaugurated O'Neill without opposition, gathered
his clansmen and marched against the MacDonnells,
and avenged Shane by inflicting on them a bloody
defeat and slaying their leader Alexander Og. Hugh
O'Donnell even, who had defeated Shane and led to his
death, stoutly refused to accept an English Sheriff or
to give up the least of his rights as an Irish O'Donnell.
So that Ulster still presented an unbroken front, and
as the struggle with Shane O'Neill had decimated the
English forces, depleted their treasury, and prevented
H 97
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
them from devoting as much attention to the other
provinces as they would have wished, Sydney had to
turn away from Ulster, and attempt to consolidate
English power in the South. A great confiscation of
Munster was planned via the goading of the Earl of
Desmond to insurrection, and the encouragement of
bogus English claimants to Irish estates. Sir Peter
Carew was the first of these, and though he finally held
nothing, he and his successors (who included Boyle, the
adventurer progenitor of the Earls of Cork) pointed the
moral for the land-holding Geraldines of the South, and
facilitated James Fitzmaurice in the foundation of the
Second Geraldine League.
Sydney gathered a considerable force and marched
through Munster in 1567, after the death of Shane
O'Neill. In his dispatches he waxes eloquent on the
miserable condition of the country, as a result of the
feud between the Earls of Ormond and Desmond, but
that did not prevent him adding to it, and as he went
he, as he doubtless would put it, made examples to
strike terror into the hearts of the unrighteous. The
Munster nobles made their peace with him on his pro-
gress, and at Kilmallock he arrested the Earl of
Desmond, and shortly afterwards his brother, John of
Desmond, and sent them to England, where they were
lodged in the Tower, this being nominally to answer
charges in connection with the Desmond-Ormond feud,
but no charges appear to have been formulated.
It was to John of Desmond that Shane O'Neill had
written in 1565 urging a combination of all Ireland,
both the Irish and what the annals call the " English
of Ireland," against the English Government, and
though this exhortation produced no apparent effect
yet the seed must have struck root in the one Geraldine
of that generation who had a head on him — James
Fitzmaurice. Fitzmaurice was Desmond's cousin, a
poor cousin without land or riches, who adhered loyally
to the head of his house, although Desmond's countess,
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THE SECOND GERALDINE LEAGUE
who was a Butler and disliked Fitzmaurice, interfered
effectively to prevent Desmond making any proper pro-
vision for him. Thomas Russell in his account of the
Fitzgeralds (derived from his father who had personal
knowledge) thus describes him: — "This James Fitz-
maurice was a brave and gallant gentleman, witty,
learned, impassionate, circumspect, active, generous,
devoute, subtill, and quick of apprehension, eloquent,
of a high and adventurous polliticke and dissembling
mind ; too forward and apt to travaile, to take great
paines, and to endure thirst, cold and hunger; not much
given to the pleasures of Bacchus or Venus," and on
being appointed by Desmond (from the Tower) in 1568
to rule in his absence he took advantage of the appre-
hension, which was caused by Desmond's arrest, by the
coming of the adventurers with their bogus claims, and
by the stiffening of the Government towards the Catholic
religion, to attempt what Shane O'Neill had desi-
derated— a union of all born in Ireland against the
English Government — Fitzmaurice acted quickly on his
authority from Desmond, mobilised the Desmond forces
and garrisoned his castles, and then proceeded to form
a League of all the Munster chiefs and nobles, both of
Irish blood and English blood, against the Government.
It is fairly certain that Desmond himself knew nothing
of this project of Fitzmaurice's, though John of Des-
mond probably did know, and it is uncertain how long
the project had been on foot. Fitzmaurice probably
had it in his mind for some time. But, at any rate, in
a year's time, i.e., in 1569, the League was launched
and, as the annals put it, "James, the son of Maurice,
son of the Earl, having become a warlike and turbulent
person this year, all the English and Irish of Munster,
from the Barrow to Cape Clear, joined and united with
him in a League against the Council of the Sovereign."
In a brief period they overran Munster and South
Leinster, but they had no great military capacity, and
the war resolved itself into a series of raids rather than
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
battles. Fitzmaurice had been in negotiation with
O'Brien of Thomond and with Torlogh Luineach, both
of whom had promised to join him, and O'Brien did
take the field in his own district, but Torlogh was pre-
vented by an accident (real or assumed) to his leg.
The Leaguers appear to have acted in small bodies all
over Munster, there being no co-operation with O'Brien,
for instance, and when Sydney and Carew marched
South to repress the League they found little difficulty
in dispersing it. Carew moved against the South Leinster
Leaguers, who were besieging Kilkenny, and defeated
them, and this ended the insurrection in Leinster, which
was not participated in by the Irish clans. Sydney for
his part marched with little opposition to Cork, and
received the submission of the majority of the Munster
Leaguers, thence to Limerick, where Sir Edmond Butler
submitted, and thence into Connacht, where O'Brien
of Thomond submitted. Fitzmaurice himself held out
for another three years, submitting in 1573 when his
forces had wasted away, but he was still formidable
enough to escape harsh terms, and was left at large
upon promise of good behaviour. Elizabeth, of course,
was not particularly out for Fitzmaurice's head, and she
may have hoped to use him in some way to further her
designs against Desmond.
The second Geraldine League is remarkable in Irish
history not so much for what it accomplished as for
what it portended. It portended the unity of all Irish-
born folk, and it postulated England as the enemy of
Ireland, and common agreement amongst Irishmen as
the only way of keeping England out of Ireland.
Shane O'Neill had been the first to recognize that,
and in the day of his greatest strength, in 1565, he had
made tentative efforts towards a national league, and
now the recognition came from one of the " English in
Ireland," and the idea did get itself actually embodied
in the proclamation which Fitmaurice issued, and
actually translated into action in the League, which
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THE SECOND GERALDINE LEAGUE
included, as the annals tell us, " all the English and
Irish of Munster " ! But Munster had been too
many times devastated, too rent and disordered, too
long under English grip, to produce a leader strong
enough to direct a National League, though it did
produce one to conceive it and establish it, and it was
left for the North, still untouched by English hands,
to establish a national confederacy and to produce a
leader to guide it almost to victory, in the person of
Hugh O'Neill. Still, Fitzmaurice's proclamation,
addressed to the " prelates, princes, lords, estates,
citizens, and the people of Ireland," is worth giving at
some length. It runs as follows : —
"Our Holy Father, Pope Gregory XIII, Christ's
Vicar on earth, perceiving what dishonour to God and
his saints — what destruction to Christian souls in
Ireland and England — what sedition, tumult, spoil,
and murder hath fallen to Scotland, France, and
Flanders, by the procurement of Elizabeth, the
pretended Queen of England ; perceiving also that
neither the warning of other Catholic princes and good
Christians, nor the sentence of Pope Pius V, his pre-
decessor, nor the long sufferance of God, could cause
her to forsake her schisms, heresy, and wicked attempts,
as he now purposes, not without the consent of other
potentates, to deprive her actually of the unjust
possession of these kingdoms, which she uses for her
chief instruments of her impiety; so he first of all
attempts the said actual deprivation by means of our
dear country, wherein he does us more honour and
favour than can easily be expressed in words." Then
it dilates on the glory that will accrue to Ireland if he
should stamp out heresy, and states that His Holiness
" considers the proper power of our country sufficient
for this exploit, and no wonder, for if we ourselves list
not to hinder one another, but do agree and join
together (as he trusts we will, and indeed we ought
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
to do), it is certain that there is no power in this realm
able to withstand our forces." It goes on to argue
against the possibility of many men being sent from
England against them, " the pretended Queen can make
no great army out of any part of England, but the
greatest number of them must be husbandmen, which
commonly are all Catholics, and they will not fight
against the cross of Christ, erected and set up by His
Vicar, under whose banner we fight." Then follows a
noble appeal to the chief men of Ireland to sink all
quarrels and differences, and " to come with all speed
possible, or to send your lawful attorneys, to the place
where I am, to the end that we may there make a per-
petual peace, league, and friendship, first to the utter
destroying of schism and heresy, and next to the
establishing of true love and amity amongst ourselves,
whereof the perpetual wealth of our dear country is like
to ensue.
" And here, considering the wariness, or rather
\viliness of some men who, for their own worldly
security, will see what others do before they them-
selves move out of their place, and others pretending
the better to prepare themselves for their self-coming,
will also use delay only to see what event the time is
likely to have. And knowing that in the meantime the
common enemy of God and of us all will not cease to
his best against me, and thereby great damage may
come to me and my company before that my friends
resort to me ; for this cause I must needs most earnestly
request those that indeed have zeal in God's honour,
and to their countries, not to use such delays, but with
all speed to show good examples unto others, being
assured that, besides the favour of God Almighty, His
Holiness, and such other potentates as in this behalf
join with His Holiness, will reward any man with
honours, goods, and inheritance, according to the
readiness which he shall show in furthering this holy
cause.
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THE SECOND GERALDINE LEAGUE
" This one thing I will say, which I wish to be
imprinted on all our hearts, if all we that are of good
mind would openly and speedily profess our faith by
resorting to His Holiness's banner, and by commanding
all your people and country to keep no other but the
Catholic faith, and forthwith to expel all heresies and
schismatical services, you should not only deliver your
country from heresy and tyranny, but also do that
most godly and noble act without any danger at all,
because there is no foreign power that would or durst
go about to assault so universal a consent of this
country, being also backed and maintained by other
foreign powers, as you see we are and, God willing,
shall be.
" In omnia tribulatione spes mea Jesus et Maria.
"JAMES GERALDYNE."
Fitzmaurice, it is evident from this, thought that
his best chance of forming his League was by an appeal
on religious grounds. The Pope had just then excom-
municated Elizabeth, and probably he thought to
increase his strength at home as well as to increase
the chance of help from the continent, by making the
war a religious war. But this was a mistake. There
had up to then been little religious persecution in
Ireland, and the Irish people, contrary to their reputa-
tion, are not inclined to religious quarrels even when
they have justification. They will fight for land, or
for glory, or for an idea, but they do not normally
include religion amongst the things for which they will
fight. Not that they are indifferent to it, but that they
are naturally tolerant in regard to it, and require it to
be much diluted as a casus belli. It would probably
not have mattered, however, what the professed motive
of the insurrection was if it could have produced a
leader capable enough, in a military way to have
combined all the forces of the League into one army,
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
and to have manipulated them in one army. But
it produced only guerilla leaders, raiders, and they were
unable to hold their ground before Sydney's formidable
army, which disposed of them singly.
The Earl of Desmond and John of Desmond were
realeased shortly after Fitzmaurice's submission, and
after being on his keeping for a year because the
English would not restore some of his castles, Desmond
was persuaded to an abject submission in 1574, upon
which Fitzmaurice left Ireland to seek help on the
continent. For five years he went from court to court,
and eventually the Pope sent eight hundred men, under
one Thomas Stukeley, and Spain sent one hundred,
with which latter body went Fitzmaurice and the Pope's
Legate, Dr. Sanders, with the Papal banner and the
Papal blessing. Stukeley diverted his eight hundred
to a Portuguese expedition against the Moors, which
was annihilated, and, therefore, when Fitzmaurice and
his hundred landed at Smerwick Harbour in 1579 he
waited in vain for Stukeley and his eight hundred.
John and James of Desmond joined him, but the Earl,
who had now determined to be loyal, notified the Deputy
of his arrival, and himself, with his forces, blockaded
Fitzmaurice at Smerwick, awaiting the arrival of
Ormond and the Deputy, with the English forces.
Fitzmaurice had sent messengers to Clanrickarde, to
Turlogh Luineach, and to the Leinster clans, urging a
general hosting, and he now broke through Desmond's
blockade, and made for Connacht, but in a skirmish at
Harrington's Bridge, in Limerick, he was mortally
wounded, and with him vanished the hope of a renewal
of the League.
James Fitzmaurice has hardly had justice done to
him. He was not a military leader, but he was a thinker,
and he must be recognized as one of the predecessors
of Tone in formulating an all Ireland nationalism.
From his first insurrection in 1569 until his death he
was consistently rebel, working for insurrection when
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THE SECOND GERALDINE LEAGUE
he was not actually engaged in it. He was the only
man of the Geraldines of that time who fought definitely
on principle; he fought for Ireland as a whole rather
than for his own little corner of it; and he was persis-
tent in his attempts to accomplish that which he knew
would put it out of England's power to interfere in
Ireland — a unity of the whole people of Ireland.
It was Wolfe Tone who said, in his day, that if it were
only a corporal's guard that were being sent to the
assistance of his country he would go with it. And a
similar saying is recorded of Fitzmaurice. In 1580
Drury captured a friar named " O'Haie," and he was
duly "examined" at the Tower. His examination
contains the following: — "Coming to Rabdio in Galicia,
James Fitzmaurice asked Dr. Sanders * How doth your
ship and soldiers?' And then Sanders said * that the
King (of Spain) would not suffer him to bring away
neither ship nor soldiers." And James answered, ' I care
for no soldiers at all; you and I are enough; therefore
let us go, for I know the minds of the noblemen in Ire-
land." There speaks a mind which is akin to that of
Tone. Like Tone, he was a "rebel" from conviction,
and that conviction remained unaffected by adversity,
exile, and the wearisome round of pleading at foreign
courts. But even a Fitzmaurice could not save an
aristocracy which.stood neither English nor Irish wholly,
but something of each, and the Munster Geraldines were
doomed. Neither to England nor to Ireland were they
essential — and the Undertakers were hungry for land.
105
CHAPTER XV
THE LAST EARL OF DESMOND (1579-1583)
When Garrett, Earl of Desmond, was arrested by
Sydney in 1567, he was a man of mature age, but still
vigorous and turbulent. He had never been a man of
any capacity, but he had at least had a will of his own
and the indomitable courage of his class. All his life
had been spent at war — with Ormond, with McCarthy
Mor, and with other of his neighbouring chiefs — and
it is told of him once, after having been heavily defeated
and captured by the Butlers, that being jeered at by
his captors and asked " Where now is the great Earl of
Desmond?" he replied defiantly, " Where he ought to
be, on the necks of the Butlers," for they were at the
time carrying him in triumph on their shoulders. He
had done nothing big in his life, but he had held his
own. Such was the Desmond whom Sydney arrested
in 1567, and sent to the Tower: but it was a different
Desmond who was released in 1573. His captivity seems
to have taken away his courage and resolution, and left
him with only one mastering desire, the desire to keep
his head and his lands secure. The captivity had
broken his spirit, and hence his abject submission and
his taking the field against Fitzmaurice, when the latter
landed at Smerwick.
His protestations and deeds of loyalty were, however,
of no avail. The Undertakers were determined to get
his lands for confiscation, and the remainder of his life
was a struggle, which he eventually lost, to prevent
himself being forced into insurrection. Successive
Deputies treated him as a rebel, although no act of
rebellion could be urged against him, and increasingly
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LAST EARL OF DESMOND
severe demands upon his loyalty were made by each
new Deputy, until at last they were forced to proclaim
him with little or no cause, their goading patience
exhausted.
After Fitzmaurice's death, Desmond hastened to Sir
William Drury to assure him that he had had nothing
to do with Fitzmaurice's coming, and as the contrary
could not well be sustained in view of the unchallenge-
able fact that Desmond had not alone refused to join
Fitzmaurice but had blockaded him, his protestations
had perforce to be accepted. His young son was taken
from him as hostage, and he was promised that his
territory would not be molested. Shortly afterwards,
however, Drury died, after having been badly beaten
by John of Desmond, who had gathered up the threads
of the Geraldine League and had managed to get an
army together, and Sir Nicholas Malbie, who succeeded
Drury as President of Munster, tore up the agreement
made by his predecessor and marched through
Desmond's territory, burning and slaughtering. Still
Desmond contained himself, and though he gathered
his men made no move. Then Sir William Pelham
was made Lord Deputy, and he proceeded to treat
Desmond as if he were a rebel, and sent his bitterest
foe, Ormond, to treat with him. The old man offered
to do almost anything if he were only let alone. " I
shall to the utmost of my power serve against my
unnatural brethren, the traitor Dr. Sanders, and their
adherents"; but the terms asked of him included the
delivering to the Deputy of his manors of Askeaton and
Carrigafoyle, at which he demurred, and also the
delivery to the Deputy of Dr. Sanders and the
Spaniards who had come over with Fitzmaurice,
which it was manifestly not in his power to do. The
deadlock which ensued in the negotiations gave the
adventurers the chance they had been waiting for, and
on November 2, 1579, Desmond and all his adherents
were proclaimed traitors.
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
He had now no option but to fight, and he was joined
by many of the McCarthy and O'Sullivan chiefs of
South Munster. Even then no junction was formed
with the forces led by John of Desmond. They
operated in North Munster, and Desmond in South
Munster, and the war became merely a series of raids,
and the utter defeat of the Geraldines merely a matter
of time. At first they overran most of Munster,
avenged Fitzmaurice's death upon the Burkes of
Castleconnell, who had slain him, pressed Cork so
hard that St. Leger wrote in January 1580 that "no
messenger can depart half a quarter of a mile out of
the town without danger of his life," and for six months
practically had it all their own way in Ireland south of
Kilkenny. But they had apparently no plans which
went beyond raiding expeditions, little sense of nation-
ality, and fought mainly because they had been driven
to it, and with the intention only of obtaining good
terms for themselves. They were rather feudal lords
in revolt than men with a sense of national grievance,
and they looked for recruits, like Fitmaurice in his
proclamation, more on the ground that it was a war for
religion than on any other ground.
Desmond had, however, two chances which might
have been made formidable use of by any good leader.
1^1580 James Eustace, Viscount Baltinglass, promoted
and headed a rising in the Pale. It also was mainly
on religious grounds, and in his letter to Ormond, when
the insurrection began, he says : — " If the Queen's
pleasure be, as you allege, to administer justice, it were
time to begin; for in this twenty years past of her
reign we have seen more damnable doctrine maintained,
more oppressing of poor subjects under pretence of
justice within this Kingdom than ever we read or heard
(since England first received the Faith) done by Christian
princes. You counsel me to remain quiet, and you will
be occupied in persecuting the poor members of Christ.
I would you should learn and consider by what means
108
LAST EARL OF DESMOND
your predecessors came up to be Earl of Ormond.
Truly, you should find that if Thomas Beckett, Bishop
of Canterbury, had never suffered death in defence of the
Church, Thomas Butler, alias Beckett, had never been
Earl of Ormond." Baltinglass had not been a good
subject since a dispute the Pale nobles had had with
the Pale Government some years previously on a
question of taxation, and the growing tyranny of the
Government,as they became stronger in Ireland, alarmed
him, the final impulse being the increased severity
against Catholicism. He carried very few of the Pale
lords with him, but Fiach MacHugh joined him, and
together they annihilated the force with which Lord
Grey of Wilton, the Deputy, moved against him. Fiach
lured the main body of the English army into the valley
of Glenmalure, and then came down on it on every side,
half a dozen men fighting their way out, out of eight
hundred who entered. Unfortunately, Grey himself
and Kildare, who was also with the army, had not
entered the valley, and got safely away. This victory,
followed up, might have swung over all Leinster to the
Irish side and penned the English within Dublin ; but
it was not followed up, and Grey was given time to
gather another army, which he used, not against Fiach
MacHugh and Baltinglass, but against a force of eight
hundred Spaniards, the news of whose landing in Kerry,
and fortification of Dun an Oir, reached him on his
return to Dublin from Glenmalure.
The Spaniards had arms for 5,000 men, but before
the slow-moving Geraldines had joined them Ormond
had moved from Kilkenny with all his strength and
held them, and on the arrival of Grey with his new
army, the Spaniards were blockaded in their fort.
They held out bravely for some days, expecting succour,
but none arrived. Desmond and his brethren were
foraging somewhere, and the people of Munster had
been too devilishly treated to make a fresh hosting just
then. The Spanish commander, at any rate, surrendered
109
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
on promise that the lives of his troops should be spared
(Grey says he surrendered unconditionally, but the Irish
authorities say they were promised their lives and there
is no doubt that Grey lied). However, this is what
Grey wrote to Elizabeth : — " I sent straight certain
gentlemen to see their weapons and armours laid down,
and to guard the munitions and victual then left from
spoil ; then put I in certain bands who straight fell to
execution. There were six hundred slain." The
Spaniards were despatched by the sword, and their
bodies thrown into the sea, but the Irish of both sexes
who were found in the fort were hanged.
Through 1581 and 1582 Desmond continued the
struggle, with increasing ill-luck, and 1583 saw him
the last survivor of his brethren with only a few fol-
lowers, hunted all over the country, hiding by day
and travelling by night. The minor leaders had all
submitted, and even his countess had to submit, but
for him there was no submission. Many times he
offered to surrender if he were guaranteed his life and
his lands, but the Undertakers wanted his lands, and
nothing but unconditional surrender would be accepted.
He was eventually betrayed to a party of soldiers in
November 1583, by an O'Moriarty, a kinsman of his
own, and slain by one of the soldiers named Kelly.
Kelly was afterwards hanged in England for highway
robbery, and, fifteen years later, when all Ireland was
stirring at the call of the Northern Eagles, Thomas
Fitzmaurice, baron of Lexnaw, hanged O'Moriarty at
his own door.
Munster was once more quiet — pacification by terror
and by massacre. One or two extracts with regard to
the way this war was carried on by the English may
be not inopportune here. Here is an extract from a con-
temporary letter of Pelham's (March 1580) : — " We
entered Conneloughe in two companies, Ormond
towards the Shannon side and I upwards towards New-
castle, and marched all day without offence of any
no
LAST EARL OF DESMOND
enemy, wasting and spoiling the country. . . . We
left our camp guarded the next day, and searched some
part of the mountain. There were slain that day, by
the fury of the soldiers, above four hundred people,
found in the woods, and wheresoever any house or corn
was found it was consumed by fire." This was an
ordinary day's work (a score such might be cited), four
hundred human beings slain and a whole countryside
ruined. And here is the Four Masters' account of,
I think, the same expedition : " . . . they give no
mercy to rich or poor that came in their way. It was
not surprising to kill those that were able to make
resistance, but they also slew the blind and infirm,
women, sons and daughters, the sick, the feeble, and
the old."
In July 1580, Pelham writes to the Privy Council :
" The Earl's followers would gladly forsake him if they
might be received. I do not receive any but such as
come in with bloody hands or execution of some better
than themselves." These extracts are typical, and it
was no wonder, seeing that for fourteen years the tide
of war — this kind of war — had rolled unceasingly over
Munster, that it was in no condition to aid the hapless
Spaniards who landed at Dun an Oir, only to be
massacred by Lord Grey of Wilton.
If we except the insurrection of Silken Thomas,
which there is some ground for holding to have been
in a manner personal rather than national, this insur-
rection of the Munster Geraldines was the only evidence
of a national spirit exhibited by the Anglo-Irish nobles
prior to their coalescing in the great National Con-
federation which followed the 1641 insurrection. It is
probably true that James Fitzmaurice alone of them
had a definite national idea in his mind, and that where
he envisaged a united Irish nation free of English
influence altogether the others never went much
beyond the secure possession of their estates and the
undisturbed practice of their religion. Yet some
in
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
national idea, vague though it was, must have been in
them ; Fitzmaurice, as the ablest mind, voicing what
was then a general tendency. And had they had
ability, it could have been developed into a very for-
midable movement. But they had only one man of
character, Fitzmaurice, and no leader with more than
mediocre military ability, or capacity for leadership.
And therefore the insurrection, however widely spread
at some periods, was always strictly local, and in place
of one compact army they had many raiding parties,
and they were therefore an easy prey for the compact
forces of the English Deputies. It took them fourteen
years to put the Geraldines down at a time when in
none of the other provinces was there any serious
fighting, and it may, I think, safely be concluded that
a good leader in Munster would have turned the tables
and would have utilized, for instance, Baltinglass's
Pale insurrection, as the stimulus to an all Ireland
Confederation which would assuredly have had a more
rosy chance of success than had either Hugh O'Neill's
or Roger O'More's afterwards, though both these had
it in their grasp.
112
CHAPTER XVI
THE POLICY OF ELIZABETH
The policy of Elizabeth has made for itself in Irish
history a well-marked track which, after three centuries,
is as bloody as it was when Spenser beheld it after the
"pacification" of Munster. So much so that "impartial"
historians have been compelled to explain and justify it,
which they have done on the ground that the continental
situation gave England no option but to dragoon Ire-
land. The Elizabethan ruthlessness is explained by
the menace of Spain.
But if these historians would take the trouble to read
carefully all State Papers, Reports and Dispatches con-
cerning English policy at this time, they would hardly —
that is, the more honest of them — keep up this myth
any longer. So far as the English invasion in the
earlier centuries is concerned it was simply a plundering
invasion, an attempt to grab land and amass wealth,
and nobody denies that. And the instructions and
reports of the Tudors, and of Elizabeth herself, are
equally eloquent as to the mainspring of the exter-
minating policy. There is no word in them of continental
complications. Elizabeth kept her grip on Ireland
because she wanted to, because she wanted Irish land
and revenues, as her forefathers did, and as her des-
cendants do to the present day. Here are some of the
instructions to Sussex in the first three years of her
reign : — " That land cannot otherwise be brought to
obedience, but with extending offeree upon some stub-
born sort, and with peopling some parts thereof, and
especially the North, now possessed with the Scots. . . .
It shall hereafter be very meet to plant in the same
parts not only some faithful captains and rulers, but
I 113
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
also some numbers of English people ; but as this
cannot presently be done the Deputy shall have in
mind and consideration as much as may be decided
beforehand, and to embrace and to show favour to all
such persons as he shall think meet and serviceable to
that end, and yet to order the doing therein as the
same may not appear to the prejudice of the case until
a more convenient time." " But you shall do as much
as the season of the year and other accidents there will
permit to take the thoughts and strengths of the same
counties, and appoint such portions of land as shall
seem most convenient, and likewise to distribute such
part of the rest of the country as ye shall perceive
that ye may have convenient persons to take and inhabit
the same, and to use the same ground in manner of
husbandry for increase of tillage for corn." And so on.
Elizabeth's sole concern with regard to Ireland was
how best to flood Ireland with Englishmen, to confiscate
the estates of the great semi-independent Earls and
Barons, to plant all over the country little plots gar-
risoned for the Crown, so as to ensure that the revenues
of the country should go to the Crown and not to any
wealthy nobleman. That is to say, it was the same
object and the same policy which the English had
always pursued in Ireland, or wished to pursue. They
had not always had the power. Observe the phrase
above quoted: " It shall hereafter be very meet to plant
in the same parts, but as this cannot presently be done,"
etc. That was English policy always, to refrain from
extermination and confiscation when they had not the
power, but it was always the mainspring of their policy,
and it always came into operation when they had the
power. The Elizabethans were simply more thorough
than their predecessors, and hence the explanatory
historians' flank movements towards continental
complications.
The truth of the matter is simply this, that it was
not until Elizabeth's time that the English got the
114
POLICY OF ELIZABETH
chance and the strength to attempt an extermination
of the Irish people. Those who have followed this
book so far will have seen how very ridiculous is the
prevalent theory upon which all, or nearly all, our
history writers have built, that Ireland was conquered
by a handful of Englismen in ten or eleven years.
They have been misled, of course, by their own want
of the energy to look into the matter as into a new
subject, leaving out of account altogether the theories
of English writers and their sweeping generalizations.
For four centuries the English footing in Ireland was
extremely precarious, and it was not assured until the end
of the seventeenth century, when England passed the first
Disarming Act, and the Irish obeyed it. We have not
been seven centuries under the heel of England, as
some of our orators are wont to declare, but only two
centuries. The first five centuries were centuries of
actual physical conflict, during which Ireland mostly
had the better of it, and that phase of the struggle is
bound to be renewed some day.
When England first invaded Ireland, England was
not the strong nation she had become when Elizabeth
devastated Munster and Ulster. England was in the
making then, just as Ireland was, but England was
more advanced towards a centralized political unity —
she was feudal, whereas Ireland was federal. Her first
adventurers succeeded in getting into the country and
remaining there, and in the years that followed the
English monarchs sent over enough men and money
to keep that garrison in the country, without giving it
the chance to develop into a strong power apart from
England. That garrison was constantly renewed ; for
more than a hundred years it subsisted by the favour
of the Irish chiefs, by paying them tribute, just as any
minor Irish clan might, for they came in time to accept
most of the isolated settlements as necessary evils;
the "Crown" played off the Anglo-Irish against the
new English, and the Irish against both ; they governed
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
their garrison at first by the strongest of the Anglo-Irish
nobles, and gradually, as England itself began to become
more settled, and the power of its kings to increase,
they smashed up the most powerful of these nobles and
governed through a Deputy, who was nearly always an
Englishman and an adventurer, with a limited tenure
of office, a fortune to make, and no scruples. Previous
English monarchs had leant, for the holding of Ireland,
on the Anglo-Irish nobles and on the Deputy; Elizabeth
swept away both. With the Geraldines of Kildare and
the Geraldines of Munster decimated and their lands
confiscated to the Crown, and the Butlers bound fast
to England, there was an end of the great Anglo-Irish
nobles; with the carefully fostered claimants to Irish
chieftainship, backed by English soldiery and English
money, the great Irish chiefs were usually busy; and
with the initiation of the system of governing each
province by a President, the danger of a Deputy who
would be almost a king was removed, and the way was
open for an attempt to smash all resistance in the
country, and establish the absolute supremacy of
England. Elizabeth tried it. English armies had been
sent into Ireland before, when that was necessary to
preserve English influence there, but not consistently
as Elizabeth did. She poured men and money into
Ireland like water all through her reign, and she tried
to the full the exterminating policy. That was not, as
I have tried to show, a new policy. From the very
beginning the English only kept their footing by exter-
mination and confiscation. But it was tried on a new
and more systematic scale. And in the Elizabethan
generation appeared the most fitting generation to try
it. It was that generation in which England first found
herself as the piratical, blood-thirsty, power-loving
nation she is. It had all the pirate virtues — courage,
daring, endurance, and the pirate vices — cruelty, heart-
lessness, mercilessness. The whole country was aflame
with a lust for gold, and trade, and blood.
116
POLICY OF ELIZABETH
That is the explanation of the policy of Elizabeth and
the Tudors, about which so much balderdash anent
continental complications has been, and continues to be,
written* It was merely a putting into logical operation
of the principle which has operated behind the whole
of England's dealings with Ireland — that Ireland is an
uncivilized country, and that its people may be lawfully
removed by a higher civilization. It was imperialism,
and not funk, which stimulated extermination.
. CHAPTER XVII
THE PLANTATIONS OF CATHOLIC MARY AND
REFORMATION ELIZABETH (1556-1583)
The Plantation project was the constant idea behind
all the English operations in Ireland, the assumption
of English law, upon which the English title to Ireland
rested, being that the country was an uninhabited
country, no Irishman, not being tame, having any legal
existence. The three " Plantations " which are
especially noted in history books, the Plantation of
Leix and Offaly by Mary, of Munster by Elizabeth,
and of Ulster by James, merely denoted an extension
of that principle from the garrison stage to the exter-
mination stage, not the stage of extermination by battle,
but the stage of extermination by slaughter and burning
women and children, cattle and crops. They were
attempts to carry that principal to its logical conclu-
sion, and attempts strictly in consonance with the
spirit of the English. The State Papers of all ages
are full of petitions from, as it is printed often, " divers
gentleman," offering to plant this or that district of
Ireland with " good English stock." And the greatest
Plantation of all, that of Cromwell, was the final in the
way of direct extermination. Since then, the Planta-
tions have been indirect.
Henry VIII had steadily refused to agree to any
scheme of Plantation in Ireland, though this was con-
stantly urged upon him. Not so Mary. Three years
after she came to the throne of England, she issued
orders for the Plantation of Leix and Offaly. Neither
of these counties was then in English hands, but they
were the most troublesome of the Irish counties
contiguous to the Pale. The said Plantation was not a
118
PLANTATIONS OF MARY AND ELIZABETH
Plantation at all, but a desperate, merciless war. The
Irish were in possession, and a horde of English
adventurers was poured in via Dublin, assigned to
lands which the English writ never reached, and told
to conquer them. That fight went on for half a century
under Rory O'More, and Rory Og, and finally Owny
MacRory. It was a war, a guerilla war, and not a
Plantation in any sense in which that word can be
used. But it marked the beginning of the unabashed
attempt of the English to exterminate the Irish, a
beginning by Mary, cheerfully followed up by Elizabeth
and James, and concluded by Cromwell. And it was
a failure as a Plantation for a different reason from the
later ones. It failed, because neither side got the
upper hand permanently, and fighting went on until
both sides exhausted each other, and eventually settled
down together — give and take. One of Mary's enact-
ments, as I am dealing with her, is eloquent of the way
she regarded the Irish. She passed a law which gave
the Lord Chancellor power to plant the rest of Ireland
at any time he liked, by directing the appointment of
Commissioners, " to view, survey, and make inquiry of
all the towns, villages and waste grounds of the realm,
now being no shire grounds .... to limit and divide
by limits and bounds, all such towns, villages, and
waste grounds, into such and as many several
counties, shires and hundreds, as to the Commis-
sioners shall be thought meetest and convenient, and
that the said shires, counties, and hundreds, after
certificate so made, shall be used and taken as other
counties, shires, and hundreds in every other shire
within this realm of Ireland." And all this, forsooth,
because " divers and sundry robberies, murders, and
felonies be daily committed, and done within sundry
towns, villages, and other waste grounds of this realm,
to the great boldness and encouraging of all other like
offenders, by reason that the same towns, villages, and
waste grounds be not made shire grounds." Observe
119
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
the definition of waste grounds, " towns, villages, and
other waste grounds now being no shire grounds," so
that waste ground was not untilled or uninhabited
ground, but ground which was not shire ground, i.e.,
where England's writ did not run. And it never strikes
the "impartial" historians that this was done by Mary,
the Catholic, to a Catholic Ireland, out of pure
greed and covetousness, and without any " continental
complications"!
The Plantation of Munster was attempted under con-
ditions different altogether from the Leix and Offaly
Plantation, for it was attempted at a time when no
effective resistance was likely, after Munster had been
devastated and exterminated and the Geraldine brethren
slain. Spenser, taking that devastation as his model
for the subduing of Hugh O'Neill, has left a picture of
how Munster stood then. " The end will be very short,
and much sooner than can be in so great a trouble,
as it seemeth, hoped for, although there should none
of them fall by the sword, nor bee slaine by the souldiour,
yet thus being kept from manurance, and their cattle
from running abroad, by this hard restraint they would
quickly consume themselves, and devoure one another.
The proofe whereof I saw sufficiently exampled in these
late warres in Mounster; for, notwithstanding that the
same was a most rich and plentiful country, full of corne
and cattle, that you would have thought they should have
been able to stand long, yet ere one yeare and a half
they were brought to such wretchednesse, as they any
strong heart would have rued the same. Out of every
corner of the woods and glynnes they came creeping
forth upon their hands, for their legges could not beare
them; ghosts crying out of their graves; they did eate
the dead carrions, happy where they could finde them,
yea, and one another soone after, insomuch as the very
carcases they spared not to scrape out of their graves,
and if they found a plot of watercresses or shamrocks,
these they flocked as to a feast for the time, yet not
120
PLANTATIONS OF MARY AND ELIZABETH
able long to continue there withall ; that in short space
there were none almost left, and a most populous and
plentifull country suddainly left voyde of man and beast,
yet sure in all that warre, there perished not many by
the sword, but all by the extremitie of famine, which
they themselves had wrought." The confiscated land
was divided into plots of 12,000, 8,000, 6,000, and 4,000
acres each, and the grantees were bound by their grants
to plant what was practically a colony in each plot.
Everything was carefully laid down, the amount they
were to keep for their own family, and the amount to
be let to approved English settlers. For instance,
every holder of a 12,000 plot was bound to plant eighty-
six families; to retain for his own family 1,500 acres;
one farmer, four hundred acres; two farmers, three
hundred acres each; two farmers, two hundred acres
each; fourteen freeholders, three hundred acres each;
forty copy holders, one hundred acres each; twenty
labourers, forty acres each. It was a beautiful scheme
on paper, but it failed utterly in practice. In the
majority of cases the Undertakers found it impossible
to carry it out in its entirety. Either they could not
get sufficient English settlers, or, after getting them,
they were frightened out of the country by the Irish,
so that in the end most of the land was actually
occupied and worked by its rightful owners, the Under-
takers forming simply a landlord class — the beginnings
of that landlord class which has always cursed the
country. Where any attempt was made to carry out
the scheme fully, the Irish bided their time, and slew
the intruders. A letter in the State Papers — January
1597 — for instance, tells us that "divers Englishmen
have been lately murdered and spoiled, by reason they
have so singled their dwellings, that they lie open to
the malefactor, without ability of defence or mutual
succour, all English inhabitants should be drawn into
a near neighbourhood of twenty households at the
legist, and none not inhabiting in a castle to be suffered
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
to dwell out of such neighbourhood, and that the same
neighbourhood so inhabiting together, shall, within a
certain time, to them prefixed, enclose all their dwellings
with a great deep trench and quickset, if may be, only
leaving two places of ingress and egress, where shall be
strong gates, to be shut every night." And where the
settlers were neither frightened back to England nor
slain they were assimilated; this, indeed, being the
greatest factor of all in nullifying the Plantations.
They intermarried with the Irish, spoke Irish, and
adopted Irish customs, and their children grew up
Irish. Spenser, writing in 1597, *s we^ worth listening
to on this point. " And first I have to finde fault with
the abuse of language, that is, for the speaking of Irish
among the English, which as it is unnaturall that any
people should love another language more than their
owne, so it is very inconvenient, and the cause of many
other evills.
" It seemeth strange to me that the English should
take more delight to speak that language than their
owne, whereas they should (meethinkes) rather take
scorne to acquaint their tongues thereto. For it hath
ever beene the use of the conquerour to despise the
language of the conquered, and to force him by all
meanes to learne his. It were good, therfore (me
seemes), to search out the original cause of this evill ;
for, the same been discovered, a redresse thereof will
the more easily be provided ; for I think it very strange
that the English being so many and the Irish so few,
as they then were left, the fewer should draw the more
unto their use.
" I suppose that the chiefe cause of bringing in the
Irish language amongst them, was specially their
fostering and marrying with the Irish, the which are
two most dangerous infections, for first the childe that
sucketh the milke of the nurse, must, of necessity,
learne his first speech off her, the which being the first
inured to his tongue, is ever after most pleasing unto
PLANTATIONS OF MARY AND ELIZABETH
him, insomuch as though hee afterwards be taught
English, yet the smacke of the first will always abide
with him ; and not only of the speech, but also of the
manners and conditions. For besides that young
children be like apes, which will affect and imitate
what they see done before them, especially by their
nurses, whom they love so well, they, moreover, drawe
unto themselves, together with their sucke, even the
nature and disposition of their nurses ; for the minde
followeth much the temperature of the body; and also
the words are the image of the minds so as they pro-
ceeding from the minde, the minde must needes be
affected with the words. So that the speech being
Irish, the heart must needes bee Irish, for out of the
abundance of the heart, the tongue speaketh. The
next is the marrying with the Irish, which how »
dangerous a thing it is in all Commonwealthes
appeareth to every simplest sense, and though some
great ones have perhaps used such matches with their
vassals, and have of them, nevertheless, raised worthy
issue, as Telamon did with Teemessa, Alexander the
Great with Roxana, and Julius Caesar with Cleopatra,
yet the example is so perillous, as it is not to be
adventured ; for instead of these few good, I could
count unto them infinite many evill. And, indeed,
how can such matching succeede well, seeing that
commonly the child taketh most of his nature of the
mother, besides speach, manners, and inclynation,
which are (for the most part) agreeable to the con-
ditions of their mothers; 'for by them they are first
framed and fashioned, so as what they receive once
from them they will hardly ever after foregoe. There-
fore are these evill customes of fostering and marrying
with the Irish most carefully to be restrayned ; for of
them two, the third evil, that is the custome of language
(which I speak of) proceedeth."
Thus Master Spenser. This View of the State of
Ireland of his, written in 1597 at Kilcoleman, where
123
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
he was undertaking, is a very illuminating document
in parts, as illustrating the English mind in Ireland,
and throwing valuable light upon the situation as it
appeared to one who was actually up against it.
Spenser would have settled the Irish question by an
extension of the policy of Pelham and Bingham, and
Grey, by a huge army which should burn and slay until
the peace — and fever — of desolation should cover all the
land. But the next year, 1598, Hugh O'Neill and Red
Hugh O'Donnell smashed Bagenal at the Yellow Ford,
and the Irish of Munster, the " anatomies of death " of
ten years before, swept the Undertakers, including
Spenser, into a few walled towns — Cork, Mallow, and
the castles of Castlemaine and Askeaton — and repos-
sessed their ancient territories until after the fatal fight
at Kinsale.
124
CHAPTER XVIII
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— THE MAKING OF HUGH O'NEILL
(1574-1593)
One of the English — I think it was Sydney — once, at
a conference with Shane O'Neill, referred to Mathew,
Baron of Dungannon, as his kinsman. " There is no
such person," said Shane grimly. "I think you refer to
Mathew Kelly, the son of a Dundalk blacksmith."
"My father was a gentleman, and never gave any
woman the lie." We do not know now whether Mathew
was an O'Neill or an O'Kelly, and we know very little
as to the quality of man he was. So far as we do know
he appears to have been just a willing puppet in English
hands ; but Shane slew him before he got much chance,
and Torlogh Luineach slew his eldest son. And there
remained only his younger son, a boy of slender years,
Hugh. We do not know what manner of man Mathew
Kelly was, but we do know that he begot a man.
When one approaches that period in Irish history
which corresponds to the Elizabethan age in England,
one is amazed at the galaxy of virility with which one
is confronted. The best statesmen and the best
captains of the full tide of England's virility were poured
into Ireland in a flood, and Ireland answered the chal-
lenge, and out of all quarters of the island, even out of
districts drenched by blood and exhausted by famine
within the memory of a generation — out they came,
gallant gentlemen and noble ladies, gallant and J^eroic
livers and fighters. They grappled with Perrott, and
Bingham, and Fitzwilliam, and Sydney, and Drury,
and Malbie, and Waterhouse — you will find the names
125
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
big in England's history, and many more of them — and
they held their own in a welter of policies, and purposes,
and cross-purposes, and intrigues, never before or since
existing in Ireland. Lords Deputy and Lords President
came to Ireland regularly and left it regularly, with
Ireland still unsubdued, still turbulent and disaffected,
still with whole districts where the " Queen's writ was
not regarded." And Essex came with his whole army
and Hugh O'Neill sent him back. And finally, chance,
destiny, the devil, I know not what to call it, but it was
not superiority either of valour or intellect, and it was
not merit, intervened, and in the space of a few hours
a sorely beset Mountjoy, and his army found defeat
turned into victory at Kinsale, the most extraordinary
and most fatal battle the Irish ever fought. In the
whole war the Confederate Chieftains lost but this one
fight — Armagh, Clontibret, Beal-an-Atha-Buidhe, the
Curlews, Tyrrellspass, these and scores of others were
victories — again, and yet again, England's armies were
broken, but Kinsale was fatal. The story of that war,
and of that final battle, is long and involved. To deal
with it in all its ramifications does not come within the
scope of this book, but it must be dealt with rather
more fully than previous periods. There are too many
fine personages in it to be passed with casual mention.
And first, Hugh O'Neill, the organizer and the brain
of a resurgent Ireland, building up himself and his
power from nothing, slowly but patiently and with set
purpose, binding all the north to him, winning his way,
out of an English education and English training, into
the heart of Ireland. Other names and deeds come up
to the memory, names and deeds one loves to dwell
upon: Hugh Ruadh O'Donnell, sword of destruction to
the Gall, man's purpose in a boy's frame; his heroic
mother, Inghin Dubh, daughter of that James McDonnell
of Antrim slain by Shane O'Neill, who kept Tirchonaill
safe while Hugh lay in chains in Dublin Castle: Fiach
MacHugh O'Byrne, the Eagle of Ballinacor, " the main-
126
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
stay of all the disaffected of Ireland," swooping now
and again upon Dublin of the Foreigners, helping the
Irish all over Ireland: Walter Reagh Fitzgerald, his
son-in-law and lieutenant — Walter with the handsome
brown head, quick soldierly step and swift action, a
great guerilla captain, whose head shall one day greet
that of Shane O'Neill without fear and without regret:
Brian O'Rourke, who disobeyed the English procla-
mation against the Spaniards of the Armada, told
Perrott to go to hell, and gave them shelter and food,
and died for it cheerfully two years afterwards at Tyburn :
Brian of the Battleaxes, who threw Oxford and its
University to the winds, and came home to smash up
Clifford at the battle of Corrsliabh Pass; Grace
O'Malley, who held the whole western seaboard with
her fleets and paid toll to nobody: Rory Og O'More,
chief captain of Leinster, thorn in the side of the Pale,
swordman, terror by night, and Chief of Leix by birth,
by the grace of his clansmen, and by the sword;
Maguire, and O'Cahan, and MacMahon, and O'Connor;
MacGeoghegan at Dunboy, and O'Sullivan Beare at
Leitrim: good men and good w7omen all — we remember
and we shall not forget. But it is no disparagement to
any to place Hugh O'Neill first, first in genuis, first in
achievement, first also, perhaps, in tragedy. Red Hugh
O'Donnell died of poison, with the blood still running
fast in his veins, with his manhood before him, with
the game not yet lost: and others died violently and
greatly, but in their own country; but Hugh O'Neill,
that had been uncrowned king of Ireland, that had
brought Ireland nearer to Freedom than any man
before him, Hugh O'Neill lived on to become a pen-
sioner at foreign courts, to hear ever and always the cry
of his people, to dream ever and always of that
sword-bright return which never took place.
The making of Hugh O'Neill was a strange and
wonderful making. The first Baron of Dungannon,
Hugh's father, was set up by the English as a con-
127
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
venient thorn with which to prick Shane O'Neill, and
after Shane had dealt with him Hugh was removed to
England for safety and for proper training, reserved
against the time when another O'Neill, Torlogh
Luineach or some other, migh also require to be
pricked. He was carefully trained and educated in
the household of Sydney himself, learned warfare and
statecraft, and became to all appearance as polished
an Englishman as any. And, then, in due course, he
was produced in Ulster. It says a great deal for the
man he was, that he was not slain immediately by
Torlogh or by some of the O'Neill clansmen.
Some day it will be worth somebody's while to go
thoroughly into old Torlogh and demonstrate to us
what manner of man he was. The reports of him in
the State Papers are rather conflicting. He dis-
appointed the English very much, while he was
Shane's Tanist, by not attempting to hold Tireoghain
for himself, while Elizabeth kept Shane in London.
Indeed, he was so indiscreet as to slay the young Baron
of Dungannon — Hugh O'Neill's elder brother — and
thus remove an English trump card and precipitate
the release of Shane. He was faithful to Shane while
he lived, and after his death his first act on being
inaugurated O'Neill was to avenge him by an expe-
dition against, and defeat of, the MacDonnells.
Torlogh appears to have troubled the Deputies in
some ways quite as much as Shane. One week he is
spoken of as a " pestilent rebel," and the next he will
be a " well-disposed person." He and Hugh O'Donnell
between them, however, held Ulster still against the
English. Knowing the paean of triumph, and anticipa-
tion of spoil, which went up when Shane was killed,
this alone, the retention of Tireoghain as it was, was
an achievement for which he must get the full credit.
It rendered Hugh O'Neill possible. It is significant
that, so far from the O'Neill power being broken by
the defeat of Shane, Torlogh, immediately after his
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accession, could take the field and harry the Scots, and
that Elizabeth could swallow her pride and recognize
him as O'Neill. Despite Sydney's assurance that, after
the removal of Shane, all Ireland would be as tame as
a mouse in Elizabeth's hand, lo ! the Red Hand
still waved triumphant over Tireoghain. If Hugh
O'Donnell had been the loyal, respectable citizen he
ought to have been, they might have tried to bully
Torlogh and to make shire ground of Tireoghain and
Tirchonaill. But Hugh, much praised at one time in
the State Papers, who had been backed up and incited
against Shane, who had accepted the Earldom of
Tyrconnell without a "thank you," who had beaten
Shane in that last great battle, Hugh O'Donnell
intimated that he intended to rule Tirchonaill himself,
that it would not be made shire ground, and that he
would not receive an English Sheriff. And, therefore,
Torlogh continued to hold his own, with varying
success, sometimes at war with O'Donnell and the
MacDonnells, sometimes worrying the Deputy, but
alway well to the fore. In his dealings with the
Deputy he sometimes followed the example set him by
Shane. There is a proposal of his extant, for instance,
quite in the Shane manner, that he should be appointed
Lord President of Ulster, should have absolute rule
there, and would undertake to reduce all the other
chiefs to obedience and pay Elizabeth £3,000 per
annum. She did not accept, and Torlogh having made
this proposal apropos of something else, went his way
blissfully.
In the meantime Hugh was being moved about on
the stage, here and there in the tail of the various
journeys and expeditions. In the process of his educa-
tion he did many things which would be inexplicable
were it not for the circumstances : he was with Essex
on his expedition against Brian McFelim O'Neill ; he
fought against Desmond in the Geraldine struggle and
was wounded, and generally was found to be very useful
K 129
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
in small affairs. In 1574, f°r instance, he is com-
mended as "the young Baron of Dungannon, a valiant
fellow," he was then thirty-four years old, and he was
generally encouraged to worry Torlogh as much as he
could. In the years while he was making himself
secure in Ireland, we can but guess at the life he led,
always watchful and wary, always polite and calm,
always planning how to gain the confidence of the
Irish without at the same time arousing Elizabeth's
suspicions. And he did it, that's the marvellous thing ;
he gained the confidence and the respect of the Irish
chiefs, even of Torlogh, and without losing Elizabeth's.
He married — inter alia, for our Hugh was a much
married man, much more so than Shane — a daughter
of Hugh O'DonnelPs, and he married one daughter of
his own here, and one there, until he had alliances with
most of the chiefs of Ulster. Occasional outbursts of
suspicion there were against him at all times, but they
were never seriously corroborated, and Burghley and
Cecil, on the whole, thought it was safer to support
him than to sit upon him, and he seemed to be as well
able to manage Elizabeth as was Shane.
Here is a wail from Drury on Hugh's matrimonial
subtleties: "I find that Turlogh Lynagh, since my
coming thence, hath so tampered with the Baron of
Dungannon, as, notwithstanding his assured promise
unto me that he would not deal any further in that
match, yet he hath taken his daughter to wife, and sent
home O'Donnell's daughter ; and in like sort tied
Sorley Boy by giving another of his daughters to the
said Sorley's son, by which means the Scots are now
wholly at his commandment and devotion." This was
in 1579. 1° J5^3 there was a report of the death of
Torlogh, and Hugh O'Neill was in such good standing
that it was decided to back him up for the vacant
leadership of Tireoghain. But the next year, 1584, the
Lords Justices reported that he had come to an under-
standing with Torlogh. "They are suddenly growne
130
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
into a very firme league of amitie and friendshipp,
insomuch as in confirmation thereof Tyrlough, as we
heare, hath in secreate sorte, made the Baron tanist,
or secondary of his countrie, and the Baron embracing
that offer, keepeth the matter as secret as he may, for
that he knoweth it to be against Her Majesty's laws."
But notwithstanding this, when he applied next year,
1585, for the Earldom of Tyrone, and the lands apper-
taining thereto, they were granted him after some
discussion, and apparently with the consent of Torlogh,
he to pay Torlogh £1,000 per annum, and to provide
for the sons of Shane O'Neill. His position was
now secure ; he was friendly with Torlogh on and
off, was allied with all the Northern chiefs and
many of the Southern chiefs ; he is thus spoken
of in the State Papers in 1587: "He is greatly
followed, valiant, and by reason of his bringing up and
training, of far better disposition, more tractable and
polite than any of his ancestors." He was also reported
to be "the best man of war of his nation," and he was
fortifying Dungannon, but he was careful to declare to
the Lords Justices that it was as a protection against
the turbulent Torlogh and his sons. In 1593 he suc-
ceeded Torlogh as "O'Neill" without opposition, and
became at once the strongest man in Ireland.
Thus was Hugh O'Neill made: in hard, strenuous,
and unremitting labour to keep his head on his shoulders
between Elizabeth and Torlogh. There are those who
see in his attempt to free Ireland nothing but personal
ambition. Ambition! When he started out on his
great effort he was already an old man, he was fifty-five
years of age, he was wealthy, respected, comfortable,
and had only to exercise a little of that tact, of which
he had abundance? to end his days in the security and
the power which he had won to himself. But Ireland
had gripped him. From the very beginning she must
have gripped him, for his whole career is a settled
policy of conciliation and unity at home without
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
alarming the enemy, and through the years he laboured
and prepared, and struck when he could no longer
deceive the enemy. There is an Irish tradition to the
effect that, sleeping one night at Dungannon, he was
visited by the ghost of an ancient piper of the O'Neills,
who piped him into the Hugh O'Neill that we know;
and that is a symbol of what happened. For the call
of Ireland, her clear call, was too strong for that early
training of his, and he came over to her wholly. And
Shane's ghost, wandering about, went to rest quietly,
now that the head of his house was once again a man.
And Ireland found Hugh, and Hugh found Ireland, and
it was good.
132
•CHAPTER XIX
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— THE MAKING OF RED HUGH
O'DONNELL (1587-1591)
" And far away, far, far away,
In Valladolid's cloisters grey,
Sleeps Hugh O'Donnell now ;
Hugh, the undaunted, gallant Hugh,
To faith and country ever true."
Hugh O'Donnell, able warrior and statesman, had
fought with Shane O'Neill against the English in the
great campaign in which Shane smashed up the league
formed by Sussex. Later, when he became O'Donnell,
he fought against Shane, egged on by the English, who
were then trying to form another league ; and in the
last battle Shane fought, Hugh was the victor, although
numerically the inferior. But the MacSweeneys, the
Giant MacSweeneys of the Battle Axes, who straddle
over Donegal in contemporary English maps, the
MacSweeneys were formidable warriors, fosterkinsmen
of the O'Donnells, and always fought with them. After-
wards, Hugh was made Earl of Tyrconnell, but there
he stopped short. His castles of Ballyshannon and
Donegal flew the O'Donnell flag, and he stoutly refused
to receive an English Sheriff, or do any homage to the
English Viceroy, and the English were not strong
enough to attack both O'Donnell and O'Neill, with
Sorley Buidhe and Hugh Maguire in the offing. So
they swallowed their chagrin, and put the best face
possible on the matter, holding Hugh O'Neill in reserve
against Torlogh Luineach, and waiting the turn of
events in the O'Donnell principality.
133
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
As Hugh O'Donnell grew old, and his firm grasp of
things relaxed, hope began to spring up in the English
mind : for there was promise of a quarrel over the suc-
cession after Hugh's death. His heir, according to the
English view, was Hugh Dubh, ar;d the other candi-
dates were Domhnall, illegitimate, but a brave and
capable leader; and Red Hugh, eldest son by his then
wife — the famous Inghin Dubh. The English had not
made up their minds whether to run Hugh Dubh or
Domhnall, but one thing they had made up their minds
to, and that was to oppose Red Hugh.
"The men whom the Viceroys and their Counsellors
abused best, were the best "men," writes Standish
O'Grady, and truly. Judged by this test, the best man
in Tirchonaill, between 1580 and 1591, was Inghin
Dubh. She was a MacDonnell from the Isles, a race
that had been for many generations in alliance and
intermarriage with the Irish, and she had Irish blood
in her, both on her father's side, and on her mother's
side. She makes even a more significant figure in con-
temporary Ireland, than does Shane O'Neill's countess,
the Countess of Argyle, reputed also to be wise and
subtle and learned. Of Inghin Dubh, the State Papers
can say no good: they cannot even refer to her
without disparagement and spleen; they refer to her
usually as "the Scottish woman," and speculate on the
advantages that would accrue to the State were she and
" her progeny " banished out of the land. " The Scottish
woman," and the " Dark Daughter" was a painful thorn
in Perrott's side, and in Fitzvvilliam's after him, for she
held Tirchonaill firm when it was like to go to pieces
under the shaky grasp of old Hugh, and she brought
her son, Red Hugh, up to be a warrior and a leader.
A warrior and a leader she was herself — afterwards,
when Fitzwilliam, after Hugh's capture, had come up
to Donegal and installed Domhnall, the illegitimate,
brave O'Donnell as Sheriff of Tyrconnell, the Dark
Daughter came out of the MacSweeney country, whither
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
she had fled with her other children on the approach
of Fitzwilliam, on what he called a "friendly" visit, and
led her forces against Domhnall and defeated him, he
being slain in the battle — and wise and careful into the
bargain, trusting no Englishman, trusting nothing
but the strength of the O'Donnell swords, and the
MacSweeney battle-axes, calling upon the MacDonnell
kinsmen for help when she required it — "a great bringer
in of Scots," we are told she was — but always holding
Tirchonaill safe, safe for Hugh. In the last years of
old Hugh's life, and the four years of Red Hugh's cap-
tivity, she ruled Tirchonaill as no man in similar
circumstances could have ruled it, and when Hugh
escaped, and became O'Donnell, she lapses into the
shadows, her work, the giving of Hugh to Ireland, done.
All her children, Hugh, Nuala, who married Niall
Garbh and left him when he turned traitor ; Ruaidhri,
who succeeded Hugh, and fled with Hugh O'Neill; and
Cathbarr, the ancestor of the Spanish O'Donnells;
were capable and faithful, and dependable, glorious
witnesses to the heroic and patriotic woman who bore
them and reared them. Lughaidh O'Clery, a con-
temporary chronicler, who wrote a life of Red Hugh,
writes thus of her : " It was an advantage that she came
to the gathering, for she was the head of advice and
counsel to the Cinel Conaill, and though she was slow
and very deliberate, and much praised for her womanly
qualities, she had the heart of a hero, and the soul of a
soldier."
Perrott looked upon Inghin Dubh with a gloomy eye.
When he demanded her sons as hostages for her good
behaviour, she defied him and refused, and he bethought
him whether he should fight or be treacherous. And
after due consideration of the O'Donnell swords, and
the MacSweeney battle-axes, and the Scots who were
behind the Dark Daughter, he decided to be treacherous.
Just then, 1587, things were beginning to look ominous.
Hugh O'Neill had been winning his way into the position
135
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
of one of the strongest men in Ireland quietly but surely,
and so subtly that not even Perrott could succeed in
inducing Elizabeth to molest him. He was now
married to a daughter of old Hugh O'DonnelFs, and
Red Hugh himself was matched with a daughter of
O'Neill's. Perrott saw trouble ahead, and determined
to meet it by kidnapping Hugh. In May 1587, he
broached his project to Elizabeth, and in September of
the same year he effected it, and kidnapped Hugh.
The fame and promise of Red Hugh had spread through
all Ireland. He was a comely and a well-built, and a
gallant lad always, tall and strong and free, like a young
eagle, "of a countenance so alluring that he fascinated
all who might behold him," say the Four Masters; long
auburn hair, ruddy complexion, keen grey eyes, a long-
limbed, energetic whirlwind. "As for the eldest of
these, Hugh Roe," says our chronicler, "immediately
after his birth he was given to be fostered and brought
up to the high-born nobles of the tribe of Conall
Gulban, son of Niall, and it was not these alone that
got him to rear and foster, but some of the tribe of
Eoghan, son of Niall, took him, for they were sure that
something could ensure through him, if he reached
puberty. Then he continued to grow and increase in
comeliness and urbanity, tact and eloquence, wisdom
and knowledge, goodly size and noble deeds, so that
his name and fame spread through the five provinces
of Erin among the English and the Irish, even before
he passed the age of boyhood and completed his fifteenth
year. Moreover, the fame and renown of his youth
were reported to the foreigners of Dublin too, and they
reflected in their minds that there would not be one like
him of the Irish to avenge his wrongs and punish the
plundering of his race, if he was allowed to reach man-
hood. It was told them too that prophets and people,
with foreknowledge and predictions of futurity, had
announced that there would come some one like him
who would cause disturbance among them, and in the
136
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
island of Eire also, as Columkille, son of Feidhlimidh,
the famous holy prophet of the Cinel Conaill, a man
full of grace and of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, promised,
when he said: —
There will come a man, glorious, pure, exalted,
Who will cause mournful weeping in every territory ;
He will be the God-like prince,
And he will be King for nine years."
And so, one fine morning, the 2gth September, 1587,
a pirate ship, with irons and soldiers aboard, disguised
as a merchant ship, with Perrott's commission and
Elizabeth's blessing, sailed into Rathmullen Harbour,
in Lough Svvilly, and was very friendly with the people,
selling cheap wine. Red Hugh, who was in the neigh-
bourhood, with his foster-people, the MacSweeneys,
was enticed aboard, and down into the cabin. Once
there, the hatches were clapped on, all sails set, and
Hugh was safe in Perrott's hands, confined in Dublin
Castle. Had Perrott remained in Ireland, he might
have used his possession of Hugh as a lever for the
destruction of Tirchonaill — he was clever enough, and
ruthless enough — but just then he was recalled in
disgrace, and Fitzwilliam, who succeeded him, was
not able enough to grasp the importance of Hugh,
nor clever enough to outwit the Dark Daughter.
The capture of Red Hugh, under such treacherous
circumstances, sent all Ireland into a ferment, and
Inghin Dubh at once set all possible influences at
work to get Hugh back, but to no purpose. The young
MacSweeney chieftains offered themselves as hostages
in his place, even Ruaidhri O'Donnell was offered, but
Elizabeth held fast and issued special instructions to
Fitzwilliam that Hugh was to be kept. Perrott had
been offered by Inghin Dubh £2,000 to let Hugh go,
but refused : Fitzwilliam, however, was less squeamish,
and appears to have taken a bribe either from Inghin
Dubh or from Hugh O'Neill — who protested strongly
137
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
against the capture, and used all his personal influence,
then great, with Walsingham and Elizabeth to pro-
cure his release. Twice Fitzwilliam recommended to
Elizabeth that Hugh should be released, and twice she
peremptorily refused. And so escape was tried. Within
the walls of Dublin Castle, the lad of fifteen, who was
Hugh Ruadh O'Donnell was turning into a man, a man
with a flame of wrath in his soul. He held his head
high, and his body straight, and his soul free, in that
captivity, and bore himself as one should who was of
the highest blood in the land. And through it all
smouldered and strengthened that quick, high impulse
of his, which made him after his escape, one of the
greatest and most constant of Irish chiefs, which swept
the enemy out of Tirchonaill in a couple of weeks, and
shook Bingham's hold on Connachtin as many months,
which finally decided Hugh O'Neill on his great
attempt to free Ireland. Red Hugh learned from
his captivity a contempt for all which the English
power in Ireland represented, for their language and
their civilization, and their institutions, and came out
from it with a determination to pay them back for the
four years liberty they had robbed him of.
The first attempt at escape, three years after the
capture, was unsuccessful. Hugh got out of Dublin,
and into the mountains of Wicklow, but instead of
making for Fiach MacHugh O'Byrne, who would have
held him against all England, he went to Felim
O'Toole, who gave him up. Felim sent two messengers
announcing Hugh's arrival, a slow one to Dublin Castle,
and a fast one to Fiach MacHugh : but the rivers
between Ballinacor and Castlekevin were swollen with
floods, and the fords were impassible. When Turlough
O'Byrne and Walter Reach, after a wide detour,
approached Castlekevin, it was only to see Hugh,
under a big escort of mailed warriors, marched out for
the Castle again. Thenceforth he was kept in irons.
But Fiach MacHugh, the " friend of the rebels," tried
138
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
again. He managed to get a clansman of his in some
menial capacity into Dublin Castle, and through him
a file to Red Hugh, and on Christmas Eve, 1591, Hugh
filed through his irons, and through those of Henry
and Art O'Neill — sons of Shane — and the three escaped.
Outside the clansman of Fiach's was waiting, but the
horses that had been in readiness for a week had been
taken away that day through misadventure, and they
had to run. They swam the moat and journeyed on
in merely doublet and hose, in the depths of winter;
going through Dublin they lost Henry O'Neill, who,
however, made his own way safely to Ulster, but Hugh
and Art, and the clansman reached the mountains,
where cold and famine struck down Art, and Hugh's
feet began to swell and blister. The clansman left
them and hurried forward to Fiach for help, but when
his men arrived Hugh and Art had been two nights on
the mountain (Sliabh Ruadh) without food or shelter
and in the snow. " Their bodies," say the Four Masters,
" were covered over with white bordered shrouds of
hailstones freezing around them on every side, and
their light clothes and fine-threaded shirts, too, adhered
to their skin ; and their large shoes and leather thongs
to their shins and feet ; so that, covered as they were
with snow, it did not appear to the men who had
arrived that they were human beings at all, for they
found no life in their members, but just as if they were
dead. They were raised by them from their bed, and
they requested of them to take some of the meat and
drink, but this they were not able to avail themselves
of, for every drink they took, they rejected again on the
instant ; so that Art at length died, and was buried in
that place. As to Hugh, after some time he retained
the beer ;• and, after drinking it, his energies were
restored, except the use of his two feet, for they were
dead members, without feeling, swollen and blistered
by the frost and snow."
He wras taken to Fiach's Castle, and thence to
139
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Tirchonaill as soon as he was able to sit on a horse,
but he had to be lifted on and off, for his toes were frost-
bitten, and his legs still suffering the effects of that two
nights exposure. With him went the chivalry of Fiach,
ready to fight their way from Ballinacor to Bally-
shannon if need be : Turlough O'Byrne, eldest son of
Fiach, Walter Reagh Fitzgerald, his son-in-law, his
other two sons, Owny Mac Rory O'More, every noted
" rebel " in Leinster in fact. With them also went
Torlogh Buidhe O'Hagan, Hugh O'Neill's foster-
brother, who planned the escape with old Fiach.
Fitzwilliam had set guards on every ford of the Liffey
and Boyne, knowing that Hugh was at Glenmalure,
save the ford which passed by the west port of Dublin
Castle, never dreaming of an attempt to go north that
way. But over that ford, within hailing distance of
the Castle, went the chivalry of Leinster, Red Hugh,
and Torlogh Buidhe in front, and Walter Reagh in the
rear. Standish O'Grady tells that tale, as none but he
can tell it: "There was a sudden silence in the hall,
and in the silence was heard the distant hollow tramp-
ling of the hoofs of horses drawing momentarily nearer
and louder. And this was but a vanguard, for a louder
and denser trampling succeeded, a storm of hoofs, and
those hoofs plainly of the great horse or warcharger,
such was their full thunder, and such the shaking of
the solid earth. Nearer and nearer it sounded till the
storm of hoofs, the noise of that thunderous four-footed
trampling seemed to pass under the very Castle walls
on the west. A voice was heard, too, it rang clear like
a distant trumpet. The words were in an unknown
tongue, and after the voice rose a peal of mocking
laughter. Then the noise died away northward, while
men looked at each other silent and astonished. WThat
did it all mean ? Fitzwilliam's prophetic heart told
him. It was the 'overthrow of Ulster,' passing north-
wards around Hugh Roe, and by that one ford of the
Liffey, over which he had not set a guard. Ere he and
140
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
his officers could interchange surmises and conjectures,
the captain of the west port watch burst into the apart-
ment, hastily stepped to the Lord Deputy's table, and
delivered his tidings : —
" Huge Roe passing into the north in the midst of a
great troup of horsemen. One of my people saw him,
for the moon was full, and also the light of the lanthorn
above the west port fell on his face. He rideth a bobtail
grey, a hackney, very fleet and strong, and, your Honour,
he lowers his voice, ' the Brown Geraldine is with him,
the three sons of Feagh, and Rory Ogue's son ; and
Raymond Donn O'Moore, the counterfeit Baltinglass,
and many others of the gentlemen of Leinster, whom
my men noted not, seeing that they spurred too fast.
But as he rode by the west port, Walter Reagh turned
him in his shank-pillion, and with a strong voice cried
to us words which I may not repeat in this presence,
words too full of rebellion, insult, and contumely.' "
And so Hugh went home to Garret Moore's house
at Mellifont that night, thence boldly through the
garrison at Dundalk, and so to Ulster, to Hugh Maguire,
thence to Ballyshannon Castle, to his great-hearted
mother, and to his clansmen.
Thus was Red Hugh O'Donnell made, in the
first place by Inghin Dubh, slow of speech and
quick of action, tenacious and heroic, one of the great
women of the Gael, heroic mother of heroic children;
carefully trained from his youth to govern and hold
Tirchonaill, giving promise beyond his years, already
before his fifteenth year a beacon of hope to the Irish;
then thrown into a dungeon for four years, three years
in close confinement, and one year in irons, finding his
manhood and his purpose in those four years. The
promising lad of fifteen who went into Dublin Castle
came out at nineteen, a man of a set and inflexible pur-
pose with a boy's frame yet, but a man's heart and
will and a man's strength, and all the qualities of a
leader. He came out of that captivity lame, and he
141
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
was lame for life; for twelve months he was under
medical attendance in Tirchonaill, operated upon
several times; but even from the bed whence he finally
arose lame, even from his bed he sent out his fiery spirit
through Tirchonaill, weakened of late; expelled on the
one hand Captain Willis and his English followers;
and on the other Torlogh Luineach, who had encroached
somewhat on Tirchonaill; and bound all his patrimony
together as one man behind himself. Soon he was to
sweep through the English of Connacht, slaying every
man who knew no Irish, soon to inaugurate with Hugh
O'Neill the great struggle which ended at Kinsale. He
came out of his four years captivity a man, "a lion in
strength and might of determination and command,"
say the Four Masters, "of a countenance so alluring
that he fascinated all who might behold him." At
nineteen he was head of his clan, in alliance with Hugh
O'Neill, with Hugh Maguire, with Fiach McHugh
O'Byrne — and with the memory of Dublin Castle strong
in him.
142
CHAPTER XX
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— THE EVE
There are writers on Irish history who have specu-
lated, as regards this and other crises in our history,
as to what would have happened had the Irish been
abject and loyal, and "not gone into rebellion, "and they
all assume that the result would have been a happy and
a prosperous Ireland. It is difficult, when one has
calmly considered the facts and gone through the
available materials, to credit them with arriving at
that conclusion otherwise than by jumping. They
merely carry modern political prejudice into the
writing of ancient happenings, and fail in the
historic imagination which must be the basis of any
useful interpretation of history. There are not wanting
writers, even of our own day, to bemoan and beat the
breast when they come to deal with any attempt of
the Irish nation to free itself from strangulation, but
there was no alternative to those attempts, save death
and degradation, the alternative which was forced down
Ireland's throat after 1690. If Ireland, at any time
previous to 1690, had taken that course, had laid down
her arms and sent her fighting men out of the country,
she would merely have had the penal laws and the
penal degradation so much the earlier.
No English monarch, no English governor or soldier,
no English writer, from the beginning of the connection
of the two countries down to our own time, has ever
thought of Ireland save as a foreign country, inhabited
by a rude and uncivilized race, to be governed and
exploited for the good of England. That ruling idea
143
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
in the minds of all Englishmen, and its results in actual
practice, made it impossible for Ireland to do anything
but fight, whilst she had the strength and the oppor-
tunity, against an attack whose guiding impulse was
plunder, whose method was murder and treachery,
whose final goal was extermination, or, at least, depopu-
lation. One has not to go to the soldiers of fortune,
to the casual adventurers, and to the " Undertakers "
alone for evidence of this unanimity of opinion amongst
the English ; one finds it in poets like Spenser and in
otherwise decent folk like Sir William Petty. Here is
how Petty, in a memorandum to James the Second, in
1687, recommended the governing of Ireland — this,
mark you, in a " settled " period : — " This is to be done.
I. By bringing one million of the present 1,300 thousand
of the people out of Ireland into England, tho' at
the expense of a million of money. 2. That the remain-
ing 300 thousand left behind be all Herdsmen and Dairy-
women, servants to the owners of the lands and stock
transplanted into England ; all aged between 16 and
60 years, and to quit all other Trades but that of Cattle,
and to import nothing but Salt and Tobacco. Neglect-
ing all Housing but what is fittest for these 300
thousand people, and this Trade, tho' to the loss of
2 millions worth of Houses.'* And so on, to the tune
of nine chapters, in which the idea is expounded and
labelled " Settlement and Union of People by this New-
inexpensive Government and Simplicity of Trade."
This scheme of Petty's was put forward in his character
of political economist, gravely and seriously, and its
many advantages set forth. There would be no more
disputes as to priority of Parliaments, for there would
need to be no more Parliaments in Ireland, and it
would be easy and inexpensive to keep 300,000 cow-
herds in proper subjection. And, at a time when
religious feeling in England ran high, there was not
a word about religion in it ; the scheme was the out-
come of the national attitude of the English mind
144
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
towards the inhabitants of Ireland, irrespective of
blood or religion.
One might fill miles of columns of print with schemes
of a similar tendency, coming from responsible persons,
and coming at all times, even when there was least
disturbance in the country. In them, in the dealings
of the Deputies and the Presidents with the Irish
chiefs, and in the general tenour of the voluminous
instructions issued from England, either by the various
English sovereigns or by the Privy Council, even
without reference to the weighty testimony of the
various Irish records, are to be found abundant
evidence of the absolute impossibility of any Irish
generation, or any Irish chief, settling down in amity
with either the English nation or the English garrison,
which burrowed into the vitals of political unity in
Ireland. Treachery, and murder, and deceit are writ
large through the State Papers as the constituent
atoms of English policy in Ireland, as the three great
weapons upon which her grip on the country rested.
And historians, writing even with these records only
before them, as the " Savage" school of historians have
written, and bringing in a verdict of Incapacity and
Febrility against the Irish, are sometimes deliberate
liars, sometimes incapable, sometimes both, and always
political pamphleteers.
Where there has been an incursion into a nation of
a new element, an element in a minority, as the Norman
invasion of England and the Anglo-Norman invasion
of Ireland, either of two things must happen. Either
the minority is assimilated by the majority, accepts its
language and culture, and forms one people with them,
or the minority imposes its language and culture upon
the majority. In either case, you get, after the fusion
of the two elements, one people. In Ireland we got
neither, because the supply of foreign elements, which
in the case of the Norman settlement in England ceased
almost with the first invaders, in the case of Ireland
L M5
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
has never ceased, because as fast as Ireland assimilated
to her own culture one generation of invaders, another
generation came over and rode over both the older Irish
and the newly-assimilated Irish, because Dublin was
an open door through which England kept on poisoning
the Irish body, gradually overcoming its powers of
resistence until finally the poison broke out everywhere
—in Penal Laws. As soon as ever an Irishman of
English blood began to regard Ireland as his country,
he was suspect by England, and found himself as
mercilessly and as treacherously treated as if he had
been Irish for seven generations. There was always
in Ireland a garrison whose power and place depended
upon the armed strength of England, who looked upon
the Irish as beasts, and treated them as beasts, and who
looked upon the final conquest of the country, and the
extermination or abject subjugation and spoliation of
the Irish, as a thing only postponed. That garrison
was kept rigidly in that frame of mind, by deliberate
English policy, and the ramifications of that policy,
e.ven when English power in Ireland was weak, pre-
vented any lasting union of the people or any settled
peace. At any time, almost, from the middle of the
sixteenth century onwards, Ireland might have
been peaceably settled by agreement between the
Irish chiefs and such of the Anglo-Norman chiefs
— Ormond, Kildare, etc. — as were definitely portion
of the Irish nation into a nation, even with the nominal
suzerainty of England; but the first condition of any
such settlement, that the Irish should have peaceful
possession of their territories, and that the constant
legal confiscations and invasions should cease, was a
condition England never contemplated, and such a
settlement remained an unfulfilled dream in the minds of
half-a-dozen men. Gerald of Kildare, Fitzmaurice,
Shane O'Neill, Hugh O'Neill, all thought of it— but it
never reached fulfilment. England wanted a weak and
divided Ireland, from which she could draw men and
146
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
plunder, and wanted not a united, prosperous Ireland,
which would be as strong as she was herself; and so the
fight had to go on, a fight of one nation against another,
without cessation and without quarter. And the Irish
nation is there yet.
On the eve of the great fight, waged by O'Neill and
O'Donnell, the country was comparatively calm, and
English power was firm in many districts, firmer than
ever before. In Leinster, the O'Mores of Leix and the
O'Connors of Offaly, always troublesome, were quiet,
although Owny Mac Rory O'More, Chief of Leix in his
own right, was at large, and had been trained to his
Chieftainship by Fiach Mac Hugh O'Byrne. Fiach
himself, gallant chieftain of the Wicklovv hills, who had
towered over Dublin and the Pale for two score years,
had defied Deputies innumerable and beaten armies
innumerable; to whose name the English of Dublin
hushed their children ; Fiach, who had befriended and
helped every rebel in Ireland in his day, and had twice
carried his mountain men up to the walls of Dublin
Castle; Fiach had been slain in a skirmish in 1594.
And Walter Fitzgerald, Walter Reagh, the merry and
chivalrous, with more hero deeds to his credit than
years to his age, the grim humorous gentleman who
had shouted his defiance to the Castle as he brought
up the rear of Red Hugh's escort over the Liffey ford —
Walter had been taken in 1593 and hanged in chains,
and the O'Tooles and O'Byrnes were now quiet. In all
Leinster there was now no big figure standing out
against England. In Munster the tale was similar.
The "anatomies of death," as Spenser called them, had
grown again into men and women, and the McCarthy
and O'Sullivan chiefs still ruled the greater portion of
their territories, and O'Brien was still in Thomond, but
the broad lands of Desmond had no chief to link them
up, and in the Province there was no big resistance to
England. Connacht remained the most disturbed of
the Provinces. Perrott and Bingham had gone through
147
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
it with fire and sword many times, and had attempted
a "settlement" of it by what is known as the "Com-
position of Connaught," under which the chiefs were
declared to hold their lands under feudal law, and not
under Irish law. To enforce this composition, all the
forces of the English were employed, but to no purpose.
The Province was "settled" only in such portions as
the English Arms actually ran, and while they were
actually there, and outside these Irish law and custom
held. The O'Connors and the Burkes and the
O'Flahertys still kept themselves free, and Grace
O'Malley held the western seaboard. The President of
Connacht never knew when he was safe, and had to be
constantly on the alert. Ulster alone held itself clear,
to all practical intents and purposes, of the English.
O'Neill, O'Donnell, Maguire, O'Hanlon, MacMahon,
O'Cahan, O'Doherty, and Somhairle Buidhe held Ulster
still, and were now all more or less in league with one
another.
Outside Ulster there was an English Sheriff in most
of the counties, and effective English interference
everywhere. It was no longer an isolated English
settlement, struggling against an overwhelmingly stonger
Irish environment; it was an aggressive force in every
county, ready to back up with England's armies any
who claimed lands on English tenure, making friends
to-day, and confiscating to-morrow, always slaughtering,
always scheming to bring in fresh confiscations. The
methods of the Elizabethans were so thorough and so
unashamed that no Irish chief felt himself safe with
them, and so, though their position was strong, they
were on the brink of a volcano, for everywhere they
sowed hatred and distrust, and everywhere the materials
for Hugh O'Neill's National Confederacy were mixing.
English law and Irish law were at death-grips every-
where, and both sides felt that a struggle was inevitable.
All over the country still the lands were tilled and
populated by the Irish clansmen. Outside the towns
148
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
there were no large rootings of foreigners into Irish soil.
They held garrisons everywhere, and in English law
and by English swords they held a lot of the land, but
they were only on the surface yet. All the plantations,
and all the plans for settling Englishmen on the soil of
Ireland, had failed. They were either driven out or
assimiliated. And so, when the war did come, the
English were cleared into the fortified towns in a few
weeks.
149
CHAPTER XXI
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— CLONTIBRET AND DROM FLIUCH
AND THE YELLOW FORD (1595-1598)
Hugh O'Neill remained on good terms with Elizabeth
as long as that was possible, and did everything in his
power to avoid overt anti-English a.cts in Ireland. He
had served with alacrity under various of Elizabeth's
Deputies against various Irish chiefs, against Desmond
and against Maguire, for instance, and he had kept his
*' English " aspect held up to Elizabeth all the time.
Yet he won his way at the same time into the hearts
of the Irish, and when Torlogh, after a long and
honourable O'Neillship, died, Hugh was tumultously
and without hesitation inaugurated O'Neill. Even
that he managed to defend to Elizabeth on the ground
that if he had not been inaugurated O'Neill somebody
else would. His personal influence with her was very
great, for the repeated reports by various Deputies in
the years prior to 1594-5, to the effect that Tyrone, as
they called him, was plotting against her, was making
alliances with the Irish chiefs of Ulster, and encourag-
ing Fiach MacHugh and every other rebel in Leinster,
failed to move her. She persistently refused to sanction
any acts of hostility by her Deputies against O'Neill,
and as late as May 1594, superseded Fitzwilliam,
mainly upon a complaint against him by O'Neill of
acts of aggression, and ordered the new Deputy that
he should " nowise attempt anything against the Earl
and his people." Hugh himself had long been prepar-
ing for war; his friendship with O'Donnell, with
O'Hanlon, with Maguire (despite his service against
150
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
him, which Maguire, doubtless, understood), with
Fiach, all stamp him with a preparation for a big fight.
By an old agreement, made when Elizabeth feared
Torlogh Luineach more than anybody else, and relied
upon Hugh to be a docile thorn in Torlogh's side, he
was entitled to keep six trained companies at Elizabeth's
expense. He kept them, with a vengeance, for by
constantly changing the personnel of the companies,
he trained all his clansmen to arms ; he bought a lot
of lead " for the roofing of a new house," and turned it
quietly into bullets ; and he built a fort at Dungannon
for his own protection and the protection of " Her
Majesty " against Torlogh, who, let us hope, rejoiced
in the joke. Even yet, in 1594, Hugh was not ready
to begin the fight. He had Ulster with him now, and
portion of Connacht, and portion of Leinster, but I
believe he would have held his hand and waited until,
as Roger O'More had in 1641, he had a National
Confederacy in his hand, organized and determined,
before moving. But events, and the suddenly aroused
suspicion of Elizabeth, and the glorious uncompromis-
ing fighting spirit of Red Hugh, opened the campaign.
In the skirmishes which went on in Fermanagh, in
North Connacht, and elsewhere, O'Neill had hitherto
been altogether behind the scenes. He knew that a
suspicion by Elizabeth that he was in an Irish league
would throw the whole force of England against Ulster,
and he did not want that. So long as she thought
O'Neill loyally inclined, so long she let things be, even
though O'Donnell smote her lieutenants for fifty and a
hundred miles outside the borders of Tirchonaill.
When help was to be given to Maguire or O'Hanlon,
or O'Rourke, it was O'Donnell who sent it. Red Hugh,
by this, not alone had consolidated his own territory,
but had won all North Connacht save for occasional
raids by the President of Connacht from one of his
fortified towns. Early in 1593 Fitzwilliam had invaded
Fermanagh in force, and Maguire was driven out to
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Tirchonaill, but the next year he came back with Red
Hugh and his clansmen thundering behind him, and
Fermanagh was Maguire land again, save Enniskillen,
which they besieged. While O'Donnell was again in
Tirchonaill for reinforcements, Bingham marched to
the relief of Enniskillen, and Maguire was threatened
with overwhelming. To the relief came Cormac
O'Neill, Hugh's brother, and Bingham was completely
defeated. Whether Cormac was sent by Hugh is
uncertain, but the probability is that he was not, and
that Hugh would have preferred a temporary defeat of
Maguire to his own embroilment with Elizabeth. But
Cormac's action was the last straw, and Elizabeth's
previous trust in Hugh was changed at once into
malevolence, and she sent orders that he was to be
" stayed " if he came to Dublin. In a final effort to
avert war, and not knowing of Elizabeth's change of
front, he astonished the Deputy by coming to Dublin,
bearding the Council, and challenging them to prove
anything against him. They could do nothing but
accuse him valiantly, for proofs there were none, and
he as valiantly denied, and finally the Council, after
much hesitation, decided not to charge him. Ormond,
however, told him in private of Elizabeth's secret orders,
whereupon Hugh departed, and the long sparring was
over. Elizabeth was furious when she heard that the
Deputy had let him slip. " This was as foul an over-
sight," wrote she, "as ever was committed in that
kingdom. The natures of treason are secret, and not
to be proved, for the most part, but by presumptions.
(Lovely, that!) He coming in of purpose to offer
personal purgation, with great reason you might have
stayed him /*"// proofs had been made, or kept him in
suspense upon his trial until you had received our
pleasure. You alleged that you thought it perilous;
but he or his could not have any way prejudiced you
or your estate ; and none of his durst have stirred
while he was in restraint. It was great oversight in
152
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
you of the Council there, when the Earl was first so
properly charged, to dismiss him so slenderly upon his
denials. Our commandments to you in private for his
stay ought otherwise have guided you." And again
she wrote : " We hold it strange that in all this space
you have not used some underhand way to bring in the
Earl ; and we think that by setting division in his
country, and by other sound means, he may be disabled
and reduced to obedient conformity." And at the
same time a memorandum written for the guidance
of the new Deputy — probably by the Council — states
that " he has evermore had a thirsty desire to be called
O'Neale — a name more in price to him than to be
intituled Caesar."
Elizabeth was hot for the humiliation of Hugh and
ordered his instant "punishment," and for that purpose
all the forces were gathered together, and on June 28,
*595» O'Neill and O'Donnell and all their allies were
proclaimed traitors. O'Neill moved first. He came
down suddenly on Portmore, took it, besieged Monaghan
with another force, beat Bagenal in a skirmish near
Newry, and shut him up there. Then Sir John Norris
marched up with all his forces to relieve Monaghan,
but at Clontibret O'Neill met and beat him, and
Monaghan fell. There was no roundabout way of
getting at Hugh, as they had tried to get at Shane, for
James MacSomhairle Buidhe MacDonnell fought with
him, and Red Hugh held the Connacht border. So
Elizabeth thought she would try what negotiation
would do. There ensued a long and fruitless series of
parleys and cessations, cessations due wholly to the fact
that Elizabeth had not the power at the time to crush
O'Neill, or had not the heart to pay an army large
enough. "Endeavour," she wrote at one stage, "to
procure a prolongation of the cessation, considering we
are not provided for them." And the Commissioners
on their part wrote: "We will keep them together by
means of delays until we discover how far they will be
'53
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
drawn, and their further intentions. We desire to know
whether we shall cease to treat with them after
acquainting them with the easiest of Her Majesty's
demands. O'Donnell carrieth great rule amongst them,
and Philip O'Reilly is a great Councillor." And they
tried the ancient game of division, tried to parley
separately with O'Donnell and found Red Hugh, as
they mournfully wrote it, "most resolute." The two
Hughs refused to treat separately, and refused to treat
only on their own account. They represented every
chief with whom they were allied, McMahon, and
O'Hanlon, and O'Reilly, and Maguire, and Owny
MacRory, and the sons of Fiach, and refused to split
up. "We are now to let you understand," wrote Hugh
to one of the Confederates, "that the conditions where-
upon the best of the Irish have given their promise and
oath one to another is not to make peace until every
one in particular that entered into the war may have
the like peace and their right and other things meet."
Both parties were only gaining time, and there was
no complete cessation of hostilities. In Connacht,
O'Donnell's lieutenants kept Bingham and his allies
penned up, and O'Neill and O'Donnell had sent letters
to Spain asking for aid. They had also urged the
Leinster chiefs to be up and doing, and Hugh had sent
his son Conn to Munster to try and rouse Munster into
life, and had ravaged the Pale. Elizabeth, on her side,
abated her first haughty attitude, ordered Norris to
make the best terms he could, and finding finally that
the Confederates would not treat singly, and would not
abate any one of their material demands, superseded
Norris, got another army together, and sent over Lord
Borough as Deputy, and she also superseded Bingham
in Connacht by Sir Conyers Clifford. The new Deputy
tried a triple attack next year, in 1597 — Clifford to come
in from Connacht, over the Curlews; a second army
from Meath, under Barnewell, "The Baron Bold of
Trimleston," and the main army, under himself and the
154
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
Earl of Kildare, via Newry and Armagh, to rebuild
Portmore. But Hugh O'Donnell and Hugh Maguire
and Brian O'Rorke met Clifford at Ballyshannon and
drove him back, step by step, with heavy loss, behind
the walls of Boyle. Walter Tyrrell and O'Connor of
Offaly, with a smaller force, ambushed and annihilated
Barnewell's force near Mullingar, at the place now
known as Tyrrell's Pass. Borough and Kildare, with
the main army, marched without interruption to Port-
more, which they rebuilt, and then made for Dungannon,
but at Drom Fliuch, O'Neill defeated them, both Kildare
and Borough being mortally wounded, and there was
an end of that plan.
There ensued another cessation, precisely the same
as the previous one, Elizabeth preparing a fresh army,
and O'Neill trying to raise a blaze in Munster and
Leinster, and expecting Spanish aid which had been
promised. Ormond, who was an old friend of O'Neill's,
was appointed Deputy, and there were many conferences,
until finally Elizabeth definitely refused the allies'
terms, and O'Neill broke off the negotiations and
attacked the newly-erected Portmore, which Ormond
resolved to relieve. Of the new army he had gathered,
he picked 4,500 foot and 600 horse, and sent them
North under Bagenal. Bagenal hated O'Neill because
O'Neill had married his sister, and he was confiident
that with this force he would easily subdue him; but
two miles from Armagh, O'Neill and O'Donnell awaited
him at Beal an Atha Buidhe, and on August 14, 1598,
he was utterly beaten and slain, the remnants of his
army escaping, disorganized and spiritless, to Newry.
whence they went back to the Pale.
The victory was complete, and its effect was electrical.
Portmore and Armagh surrendered at once, and Bally-
mote, which had been in English hands for thirteen
years, was taken. Ireland stirred herself again, looked
up at the sun, stood upon her two feet, and reached out
for the sword; the long and gallant fight waged by
'55
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Ulster, under Shane and Torlogh, and now under the
two Hughs, made itself felt, and sent the blood
bounding in her veins. Connacht was up again, not
merely North Connacht, but the whole of it; Leinster
was up, and Tyrrell, O'Conor, Owny MacRory, and
the O' Byrnes swept it clean; even Munster, Munster
with the stench of rotting and famine-stricken corpses
still in its nostrils, with the remembrance of the inhuman
scourging of the Geraldine wars, Munster woke up; all
over Ireland the Irish, chiefs and people, rose up like a
surging wave, and overwhelmed the Undertakers.
Dublin, Kilkenny, Cork, Limerick, Galway — behind
their walls the remnants of the English crouched,
amazed and dispirited ; the Red Hand of Ulster
overshadowed Ireland.
156
CHAPTER XXII
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— THE RISING TIDE (1598)
All contemporary and reliable records bear witness
to the completeness and deadly effect of the great
victory of the Yellow Ford. The Four Masters and
the State Papers are equally emphatic, and Fynes
Morrison, Ware, Cox and company, all admit the com-
pleteness of the overthrow. It gave Hugh O'Neill an
undying reputation, not only in Ireland, but on the
continent, where he was thenceforth regarded as King
of Ireland, and it sent all Ireland stirring into a great
confederation.
Nowadays, when we realize the completeness of the
victory, how it paralysed the Lords Justices and
Council, unnerved the remnants of the English army,
and sent the Undertakers everywhere trembling ; how
it was months before any reinforcements arrived, and
that in the meantime Ireland might have been cleared
of the English ; it is easy to accuse O'Neill of a want
of generalship in not following up his victory. But he
did follow it up as much as he could, and he got to
Armagh practically at the same time as the remnants
of Bagenal's army, and never left it until he had its
surrender. But more he could not do. It was harvest
time, O'Donnell and Maguire, who formed nearly half
his gallant army, were short of provisions, and his own
commissariat was none too plentifully stocked. If he
had succeeded in delaying the fighting, as he had
wished, until he had all Ireland confederated under
him, he would have struck, and struck hard, but now
he was sure only of Ulster and portion of Connacht ;
Leinster and Munster were largely unknown quantities;
157
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
and he bided his time. With the facts as they stared
him in the face, it was the best he could do. He did
not minimise the importance of Dublin, however, for
in October of that year a plot was discovered in Dublin
to surprise the town and Castle. Thirty Irish within
the walls were concerned in it, and the attacking force
was to be 1,000 mountainy men and 1,000 of O'Neill's
own men. But O'Neill had neither the materials fora
siege nor the necessary men. The whole forces of the
allies did not exceed 5,000 men ; and, be it remembered,
that each man was a free man, and could not be ordered
about as a modern soldier can. If a clan got anxious
about the harvest, they had to be let go, for there was
neither the means nor the desire to keep them. That
instinct, the development of individuality in the Irish
civilization, their passion for absolute freedom, was at
one and the same time one of the things which most
powerfully aided England in driving and maintaining
a wedge into the Irish body politic, and at the same
time one of the things which most powerfully prevented
that wedge from being effective. A feudal civilization
might not have succumbed to that first English attack,
but only a free and virile nation could have repelled it
so long and so gallantly after it had taken root.
In April 1597, the Lord Deputy and Council wrote
a memorandum on the state of Ireland, showing that
Ulster was " universally revolted ; no part of it is free
from hostility against Her Majesty and adherence to
the Capital Traitors of Tyrone. The only places left
her beyond Dundalk are Newry, Knockfergus, Carling-
ford, Green Castle, Armagh, Dnndrum, and Oldri-
fleete"; that in Connacht "not one of the six shires
is free from revolt " ; in Leinster the O'Mores, O'Tooles,
O'Byrnes, and some of the Butlers were troublesome ;
and as for Munster, " there standeth up none that we
know, any man of name, against Her Majesty in that
province, except two chief persons of the McShees and
two base sons of the Viscount Roche, which, being
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THE NORTHERN EAGLES
followed by a rabble of loose people, stand out still."
That was substantially the situation before the Yellow
Ford, save that then North Connacht was with
O'Donnell, Owny More, and Walter Tyrrell were
threatening the Pale, and Norris, President of Mnnster,
felt a storm gathering there, although he could not
produce enough evidence to induce Elizabeth to send
him the heavy reinforcements he wanted. After the
Yellow Ford all this changed. The Lords Justices
and Council fell into a state of panic, and on the day
after the battle wrote to O'Neill: " We have taken
knowledge of the late accident (!) happened to part of
Her Majesty's forces employed in Ulster, only for
victualling of the Blackwater, and that many of them
are retired into Armagh, where they now remain. We
thought good upon this occasion to send to you on
their behalf, though we think that, in your own con-
sideration, you will let them depart without doing them
any further hurt. We are to put you in mind how far
you may incense Her Majesty's indignation towards
you, if you shall do any further distress to these
companies, being, as you know, in cold blood ; and,
on the other side, how far you may move Her Majesty
to renew a favourable conceit of you by using favour
to these men. And, besides, your ancient adversary,
the Marshal, being now taken away, we hope you will
cease all further revenge towards the rest, against
whom you can ground no cause of sting against your-
self, being employed by her Majesty in these Her
Highness's services. This much we thought good to
signify unto you, and by way of caution to admonish
you to avoid to provoke so mighty a Princess upon such
a matter as to distress her servitors in cold blood. To
this end we have sent this bearer the poursuivant, by
whom we expect your answer." This extraordinary
letter, which maddened Elizabeth, shows the state of
panic the Government were in; and Ormond alone,
then Lord Lieutenant, made an effort to save the
159
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
situation. He knew that this victory would be a
beacon to all Ireland unless it could be nullified, and
he gathered all his forces and went for the Leinster
men ; but Owny MacRuaidhri and Walter Tyrrell met
him and beat him, and he barely escaped with his
life to Kilkenny. Then all Leinster rose up, Owny
MacRuaidhri and Walter Tyrrell directing operations;
Leix and Offaly were cleared of the planters ; in Kildare
James Fitzspiers, a Geraldine and Sheriffof the county,
went "into rebellion"; the Earl of Mountgarrett, a
Butler, and an important man, made a treaty with
O'Neill, and all Leinster was in Irish hands save the
narrow margin around Dublin — with the O' Mores and
O'Byrnes within musket shot — and Kilkenny and
Wexford towns. In Connacht the news of the victory
had a similar effect ; Clifford shut himself up behind
fortifications and bemoaned the situation, and only
Clanricarde remained with the English. But Munster
— Munster which had undergone such a terrible devas-
tation, with her ancient families decimated — Munster,
Where, in April 1597, there stood up "none that we
know, any man of name, against Her Majesty in
that province" — Munster also went " into rebellion."
Norris, as I have said, had been suspicious of Munster,
without knowing why. He felt the gathering storm,
but could not stop it, and in a vain attempt to do so
he summoned the Munster chiefs and nobles to Kil-
mallock, and exhorted them to be of good behaviour,
and they answered him that they could no longer
answer for their people. When the storm broke, it
broke suddenly, and the flame went through Munster
" like a lightning," as Fynes Morrison puts it. O'Neill,
after the defeat of Ormond, and the rising out of
Leinster, had turned his attention to Munster, leaving
Connacht to O'Donnell and Maguire. And so, one
morning early in October, two gentlemen stepped gaily
over the border ; and one was young and comely, and
swift as a hawk and fierce, for he remembered the
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THE NORTHERN EAGLES
" planting " of his country, and he had been trained by
Fiach MacHugh ; and the other was older and graver,
courtly, with dancing eyes ; and a better pair never
stepped out upon a better journey, for they were Owny
MacRuaidhri O'More of Leix and Walter Tyrrell of
Meath, the pair who had beaten Ormond's desperate
venture, had annihilated Barnevvell at TyrrelFs Pass, and
were to defeat Essex at the Pass of Plumes ; and behind
them went 2,000 of their clansmen. As they went they
took castles and garrisoned or demolished them. Piers
Lacy, the Sheriff of Limerick, joined them; an Earl of
Desmond, an O'Brien, a McCarthy, started up from the
earth, and all Munster was in a blaze. Norris was at
Mallow, and he forthwith fled to Cork without awaiting
the onset, whence he wrote explanatory and apologetic
and beseeching despatches to Elizabeth. All over the
Province the Undertakers, "either for lack of comfort
from you, or out of mere cowardice, fled away from the
rebels upon the first alarm," as Elizabeth wrote to
Norris. Within a few weeks Munster was almost cleared
of the English; James FitzThomas, Earl of Desmond,
in command for O'Neill, and Norris and his men cooped
up in Cork, Youghal, Kinsale, and the castles of
Castlemaine, Askeaton and Mallow.
Mr. Standish O'Grady has asserted that in these wars
the English ar-my was miserably small, and that the
greater portion, of it was composed of Irishmen, and
that statement has formed the basis for a sheepish
follow-on by many others with less knowledge and more
prejudices; and, of course, it conforms to the usual
English myth on the subject. Now let me examine it
briefly in this present war. It is quite true that for
many centuries the English and Irish fought in an
intermixed fashion. As already pointed out, in course
of time many English settlements came to be regarded
as on the same footing as an Irish clan — were, in fact,
admitted into the Nation as a portion of the Nation;
and the old clans and new clans made alliances indis-
M 161
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
criminately, sometimes using, more often being used by,
the English. But the English army in Ireland was at
all times composed mainly of English — or at least of
non-Irish — men. After the Yellow Ford, the Lords
Justices and Council were at their wits' end to explain
the defeat, and to explain their inability to meet the
Irish in the open field either in Leinster, Ulster, Con-
nacht, or Munster; and the expedient they hit upon
was to declare that a large portion of the English forces
were Irish born, that they had all " deserted," carrying
with them their arms and ammunition, and that, there-
fore, reinforcements were urgently needed. This is a
palpable blind. An Irish clan might, and did, follow
its chief in an English host often, but they would not,
and did not, crowd into the English army. In a torrent
of rage Elizabeth, after the Yellow Ford, ordered
Ormond, on September 12, to " clear our army of the
Irish, and so order it that for this winter it may be
reduced to 8,000" — reduced, mark you, to 8,000, with
the alleged Irish eliminated. And she added, "With
an army of eight or nine thousand men it is strange
that the provincial rebels of Leinster and Wexford
should not be mastered. Writing on December i
again she complains that although Ormond had " the
great number of 9,000 men, we do not only see the
Northern traitor untouched at home, and range where
else he pleased, but the provincial rebels in every pro-
vince, by such as he can spare, enabled to give law to
our provincial governors ; besides that, the Pale is not
only wasted, but the walls of Dublin (where our State
is seated) esteemed unsafe, and (as we hear) the suburbs
thought a dangerous lodging for some of our principal
Counsellors." Under date September of the same year,
1598, there is a memorandum on the English army in
Ireland, and it is given as 10,082 foot ; while O'Neill's
forces are given as 3,540 foot and 1,043 horse. Mr.
Standish O'Grady's pet statement will not bear critical
examination.
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THE NORTHERN EAGLES
Nothing is clearer than that now the war developed
into a national struggle, to the perception of all on
either side. In October James FitzThomas, created
by O'Neill Earl of Desmond, wrote to Ormond:
"Englishmen were not contented to have our lands
and livings, but unmercifully to seek our lives by false
and sinister means under cover of law " ; and Ormond
himself writes to Elizabeth: "The Irishry in general
have combined and joined together"; and the Justices
write, "and we see daily the distresses of the realm so
to multiply in every part by a general revolt of the
Irish, pretending a general Irish quarrel for old titles
and recovery of lands." And the fight they made was
a gallant and worthy fight. Supercilious modern critics,
whose knowledge of Irish history is limited to Froude
and Lecky and perhaps Ransome, will pass it all by in
scorn: but nobody who goes to the original records,
and goes through them patiently, but will rise up with
a sense of the greatness of his race, of the greatness of
Hugh O'Neill, of the gallantry of that fight. To the
English themselves it was a marvellous resurrection ;
they actually felt the avalanche, and shuddered and
hurried behind the walls of the fortified towns. Imme-
diately poured in the usual horde of plans for the
" settlement of that realm " ; " Plant Ulster with Dutch " ;
" Divide the country into lots of 2,000 acres each " ;
" Starvation and extermination," and so on. Ulster,
even as it is to-day, was a red rag to a bull to them.
And one anonymous scribe, sorrowfully and in chastened
mood, wrote a memorandum on " The Causes of the
Miseries of the Englishry." To those of my readers
who may be inclined to regard the English Planters in
Ireland as the salt of the earth, I make a present of this
unprejudiced contemporary evidence on the subject :
" First of all, I note their great wickedness formerly
rooted, not purged, by change of air, but found still
procuring the wrath of God, according to that of the
past, ' Coclum non anima mutantur, qui trans mare currunts
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
they change the air and not the mind who cross the
seas. Notwithstanding many wise, godly and virtuous,
yet there were out of England, and other countries,
traitors, murderers, thieves, coseners, conycatchers,
shifting mates, runners away with other men's wives,
some having two or three wives, persons divorced living
loosely, bankrupts, carnal gospellers, Papists, Puritans,
and Brownists. If the enemy, by the permission of
God, had not come with a scourge against them (as
Josephus said some time of the Jews in Jerusalem) it is
ike with other plagues, the earth would have gaped
and swallowed them up."
164
CHAPTER XXIII
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— OWNY MAC RORYAND HUGH ROE
STRIKE HOME (1599)
Elizabeth set herself at once to plan a new army, and
a new general for Ireland, with a view to the immediate
subjection of O'Neill. The reports of the Council and
of the various Provincial Presidents threw her into a
state of fury, and she meditated making peace with
Spain, in order that she might be enabled to throw her
whole strength into Ireland. What maddened her was
the thought that it should be Hugh O'Neill, carefully
fostered in England, trained up to be a traitor to his
country, like the Earl of Clanrickarde, who should thus
threaten her grip upon Ireland, and animate the
momentous Irish National Confederacy which faced
her. After abusing Ormond and his fellow-councillors
to her heart's content, she resolved upon a new army
of 16,000 foot and 1,300 horse, to be led by Robert,
Earl of Essex, who had in the Spanish War taken
Cadiz, and had great military reputation, and to be
reinforced every three months by 2,000 men. When
Essex actually did muster up his forces he found 19,000
men, and the total of the English forces in Ireland at
this time was, of course, actually much greater.
The state of Ireland at the time, from the English
point of view, is given in a memorandum which was
prepared by the Council for Essex's information, and
was handed to him on his arrival. It enumerates the
"rebels" in the various counties. In Dublin, the
mountain rebels, O' Byrnes and O'Tooles; in Kildare,
the O'Dempseys, Eustaces, and Fitzspiers; Carlow and
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Kilkenny, most part in rebellion; in Leix, Owny
Mac Rory; in Offaly, the O'Connors, O'Molloys, and
O'Donoghues; in Kilkenny, the O'Carrolls and Viscount
Mountgarret ; in Westmeath, the O'Melaghlins, O'Foxes,
and McCoughlans; Walter Tyrrell of Meath gets a
special mention of his own, and we are told that Louth
and Longford are "much wasted of Ulster."
Ulster. All in revolt. Dundalk, Knockfergus, Newry,
Carlingford, Greencastle, Narrowwater, and the Castle
of Ballindarroge in English hands, "all the rest is in
rebellion."
Munster. Generally in rebellion, but " the cities and
port towns, with the best castles, still hold for the
Queen."
Connacht. Enumerates all the clans as in revolt,
the only notable traitor in the Province being Clan-
rickarde, who stuck to the English all through this
war.
The total Irish forces are given as: — Leinster, 3,230;
Ulster, 8,922; Munster, 4,555; and Connacht, 3,290;
that is an English estimate of 19,997 as the total righting
force of Ireland, a force scattered over every parish in
the island, and unprovided with artillery. The odds
seemed to be all in favour of Essex, and yet when he
departed he left the Irish stronger than before. His
instructions from Elizabeth were elaborate and com-
prehensive. She advised him first that " we shall spare
no earthly thing of ours" to bring this proud rebel to
subjection, reminded him that he was commanding a
" royal army, paid, furnished, and provided in other sort
than any King of this land hath done before," and
ordered him to reinforce the Presidents of Munster,
Connacht, and Leinster, so far as necessary, and himself
" chastise " Ulster. When she mentions O'Neill, one
can feel the venom yet ; he was to be received only upon
unconditional surrender — this was on the supposition
that Essex could beat him absolutely; then he was
empowered — assuming, I suppose, that he were well,
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THE NORTHERN EAGLES
but not hopelessly, beaten — to offer him his life, and
finally — it occurring to her that perhaps Essex might
not absolutely subdue him — he was empowered "to take
him in upon such conditions as you shall find good and
necessary for our honour and safety of that kingdom,"
and, finally, the people were to be "instructed and
contained" in the reformed religion, and provided with
reformed clergymen, for Elizabeth, now that she began
to suspect Popery, as one of the things which fanned
the Irish war, began to be solicitous for the souls of
the Irish.
Essex's army was a formidable one. In a later
despatch, Elizabeth refers to it as "the flower of our
army," and it was led by England's best captains; but
the net result of Essex's six months in Ireland — April
to September 1599 — was a series of heavy defeats if for
the English, which so exasperated Elizabeth that
eventually he went to the block. The various blood-
thirsty gentlemen who wrote to the Council at this
juncture, recommending their special methods of ending
the war, were all agreed upon one thing, to begin with
Minister and move upwards; and Ormond and his
fellows were, or pretended to be, of the same opinion.
Essex himself wanted to attack Ulster at once, but they
persuaded him to try the other plan, and accordingly
he did so. After reinforcing various garrisons, and
issuing various proclamatinos— in regard to which the
Four Masters say "not many of the Irish, however,
responded to these proclamations " — he sallied South
with 7,000 men, well-armed and lightly-baggaged.
Owny Mac Rory, and Tyrrell, and Domhnall Spaineach,
and other Leinster chiefs kept him company, and kept
him in a constant state of nerves. Writing to Elizabeth
afterwards he complained that he was constantly
harassed, and never free from interruptions, and that
his health was breaking. His army certainly was. The
Irish, scattered as they were into numerous small bands,
attempted no general action, but they worried Essex
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
incessantly, day and night, ambushing him, attacking
his rearguard, and generally adopting the tactics which
Art Mor MacMurchadha adopted against Richard II.
At the same time, Owny and Tyrrell watched every
opportunity of vitally attacking him, and took the one
chance they got. Moving through the Pass of Plumes,
near Maryborough, his vanguard got a bit in front; and
Owny Mac Rory promptly fell on the rearguard and
decimated it; the pass being called the" Pass of Plumes"
since owing to the number of plumes lost by the English.
But Essex pursued his way to Munster, where the
Geraldines and MacCarthys took up the running from
O'More and Tyrrell, and as effectively. He joined his
forces with those of Sir Thomas Norris, and at Croom
the allies attacked and defeated him, Sir Thomas
Norris being mortally wounded. He took Cahir Castle,
after battering its walls to pieces with heavy ordnance,
and Askeaton; but the Geraldines about the same time
took Desmond's old stronghold at Castlemaine; and,
weary and dispirited, Essex turned and made for
Dublin, arriving there with a diminished and broken
army, and with the news before him that a sally by
600 English, under Sir Henry Harrington into the
Wicklow Hills had been met and smashed by the
O'Byrnes. Of this expedition Elizabeth wrote later to
the Lord Justices and Council, "and therefore can we
not but still challenge you all, and you especially, our
cousin of Ormond, that contrary to that Council you
did so strangely urge our Lieutenant against his own
mind (as he protesteth) still to range so far from place
to place in Munster, and to spend so long time as not
to arrive in Dublin before July were a third part spent,
whereby you know that all the forces he carried (which
were the flower of our army) were tired and harassed,
and it accounted honour enough to bring them back
again; whereof you saw this effect to follow, that in
some corners whole regiments were defeated, in many
places divers disasters happened, and in all places,
1 68
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
wheresoever the army itself marched, some losses fell
of our best commanders."
Stung by Elizabeth's letters to himself, taunting and
reproachful letters, Essex resolved on another attempt.
She had ordered him to go for O'Neill, and for O'Neill
he went, adopting the plan of Lord Borough — Clifford
with the forces of Connacht to attack O'Donnell from
the Connacht side, while he should attack O'Neill
himself via Armagh. Sir Conyers Clifford was a
capable soldier, and he made his preparations well.
He sent O'Conor Sligo — an English O'Conor — into
Sligo to make a diversion, but O'Donnell beat him
into Collooney Castle, which he besieged ; and Clifford
gathered all his forces, 2,000 men, and went for
O'Donnell. From Athlone he marched to Boyle, and
thence forward to Sligo — held by O'Donnell save for
Collooney — via the Curlew Mountains. He had
already been beaten by O'Donnell at Ballyshannon
at the beginning of the war, and had no mind to be
beaten again, and laid himself out with care. But in
the Curlews his army of 2,000 was hopelessly beaten
by less than 1,000 of the Irish under MacDermott and
Brian Og O'Rorke, under the generalship of Red
Hugh. Clifford had his infantry massed in three
divisions, with the cavalry at the foot of the Pass ready
for emergencies ; and MacDermott held the first wood
with six hundred men, and behind him O'Rorke with
one hundred and sixty gallowglasses, clad in mail and
armed with battleaxes. Through the wood went
MacDermott, giving ground, but not flying, and
through the bog beyond to the edge of a farther
wood ; and here he took his stand again. Clifford's
vanguard came out of the first wood and began to
advance, and behind him came the second portion of
his army, with the rearguard still in the wood. And
MacDermott and his men began a hot attack on the
English. They crumpled up the vanguard, threw it in
disorder on the second portion, and then when it was
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
quite disorganized, opened their ranks to O'Rorke.
Brian of the Battleaxes had been an Oxford student
when his father, Brian of the Ramparts, was hanged at
Tyburn, but Oxford saw him no more. Now he came
with his one hundred and sixty chosen, down on the
English like a thunderbolt. It was as effective as a
cavalry charge : methodically the mail-clad gallow-
glasses moved ; methodically the battleaxes did their
work, and Clifford's men broke in disorder and ran,
tumbling into the rearguard. Behind them hot foot
came MacDerrnott and his six hundred, and the dis-
order became a rout. " Howbeit," say the Four Masters,
" the English at last turned their backs to the mighty
.men of the north, and the few routed the many." Soon
the English cavalry at the base of the wood saw the
remnants of their army emerge in hasty flight, and an
English cavalry charge checked MacDermott. But he
opened his ranks again, and Brian Og and his gallow-
glasses charged and routed the cavalry. The battle
was over. Clifford and 1,400 English lay dead,
Collooney surrendered, and O'Conor Sligo made a
friendship with O'Donnell.
With this news ringing in his ears, Essex made only
a half-hearted attempt to fight O'Neill. He marched
north towards the end of August, and the two armies
met near Louth. O'Neill had the superior force, but
he did not wish to fight Essex, who was an old friend
of his, and he proposed a parley, at which they agreed
to a cessation, and at which O'Neill gave Essex a
verbal message for Elizabeth, with the terms upon
which he would make peace. Essex agreed to the
truce, and undertook to convey the terms personally
to Elizabeth ; terms which he, evidently, in view of the
strength of the Irish position, deemed reasonable.
These terms included the recognition of the Catholic
religion, that all Irish offices should be confined to
Irishmen, that the Irish chiefs should be restored to
and recognized in possession of of their hereditary
170
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
territories, and that every Irish chief who desired it be
permitted to keep a fleet. Cecil's comment on them
was the one word " Ewtopia," and Elizabeth herself
got angrier than ever. " What," said she sarcastically
to Essex, " would become of all Munster, Leix and
Offaly, if ' all the ancient exiled rebels be restored to
all that our laws and hereditary successions have
bestowed upon us.'" O'Neill refused to modify the
terms, or to treat with Ormond or any of the Council,
whom he did not trust : and in due course he gave the
prescribed fourteen days notice for the cessation of the
truce, and the war went on.
Essex's record in Ireland has been put very succinctly
by Standish O'Grady. " Historians," he writes, " have
not at all sufficiently recognized his very bad record as
chief Governor of Ireland. . They say he did nothing,
but, in fact, he did a great deal less, for he was beaten
by the insurgent lords at many points. As he marched
through the Queen's County, young O'More, lord of
that region, routed his rearguard and plundered his
baggage in the Pass of Plumes. At Askeaton, County
Limerick, he was beaten by the Geraldines, and driven
back out of West Munster. The sons of Feagh
MacHugh, defeated his cavalry in one battle, and his
infantry in another. Finally, his lieutenant, Sir Conyers
Clifford, President of Connacht, was first beaten by
Red Hugh at Ballyshannon, and afterwards beaten
disastrously in the Curlew Mountains." That is pre-
cisely all that Essex was able to accomplish with his
20,000 men. He left O'Neill in a stronger position
than before, stronger, inasmuch as, without O'Neill or
his own army firing one shot, Essex and his lieutenants
were defeated individually and collectively and, as
Elizabeth put it, " brought in never a capital rebel."
Writing about this period about Hugh O'Neill's many
misdeeds, a State Paper scribe says, " He stirreid
Feagh MacHugh and his sons, Donnel Spainagh and
Brian McDonough, Onie O'More, and the O'Connors,
171
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
with some bastard Geraldines, and many Irish septs,
to raise rebellion in Leinster and Meath, and made
Connachtmen, who of themselves are most apt thereunto,
to rise upon the sudden." That unsolicited tribute to
Connacht, which I have italicized, ought not to go
down to oblivion.
172
CHAPTER XXIV
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES.— O'NEILL'S MARCH THROUGH
LEINSTER AND MUNSTER (1600)
In the State Papers Calendar for November 1599,
there are several lists purporting to be the terms upon
which Hugh O'Neill was willing, at this time, to make
peace. There is no guarantee of their authenticity,
and the probabilities are that they are, none of them,
quite authentic ; and, furthermore, we have no easy
way now of determining what in them is authentic and
what imagination. In his negotiations after the
Yellow Ford and with Essex, O'Neill committed
nothing to paper, and these lists can, therefore, only
be taken as so many memorada drawn up by the
English, and based upon the reports of their agents,
as to the terms upon which it was believed that peace
could be made. It is interesting to chronicle what they
were at this period, when the Irish had not alone been
uniformly successful, but were getting into a stronger
position every day. One of these lists is marked by
Cecil "Eutopia," and contains twenty-two articles. It
may, I think, be fairly taken as the official English view
of Hugh's irreducible minimum. Here are the articles.
They are headed, " Articles intended to be stood
upon by Tyrone."
" i. That the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion
be openly preached and taught throughout all Ireland,
as well in cities as borough towns, by Bishops, Seminary
Priests, Jesuits, and all other religious men.
" 2. That the Church of Ireland be wholly governed
by the Pope.
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
" 3. That all cathedrals and parish churches, abbeys,
and all other religious houses, with all tithes and church
lands, now in the hands of the English, be presently
restored to the Catholic Churchmen.
" 4. That all Irish priests and religious men, now
prisoners in England, be presently set at liberty, with
all temporal Irishmen, that are troubled for their con-
science, and to go where they will without further
trouble.
" 5. That all Irish priests and religious men may
freely pass and repass, by sea and land, to and from
foreign countries.
" 6. That no Englishman may be a churchman in
Ireland.
" 7. That there be erected an University upon the
Crown rents of Ireland wherein all sciences shall be
taught according to the manner of the Catholic Roman
Church.
" 8. That the Governor of Ireland be at least an
Earl, and of the Privy Council of England, bearing
the name of Viceroy.
" 9. That the Lord Chancellor, Lord Treasurer,
Lord Admiral and Council of State, the Justices of the
Laws, Queen's Attorney, Queen's Serjeant, and all
other officers appertaining to the Council and Law of
Ireland, be Irishmen.
" 10. That all principal governments of Ireland, as
Connacht, Munster, etc., be governed by Irish noblemen.
"ii. That the Master of Ordnance and half the
soldiers, \vith their officers, resident in Ireland, be
Irishmen.
" 12. That no Irishman's heirs shall lose their lands
for the fault of their ancestors.
" 13. That no Irishman's heir, under age, shall fall
in the Queen's or her successors' hands, as a ward, but
that the living be put to the heir's profit, and the
advancement of his younger brethren, and marriage of
his sisters, if he have any.
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THE NORTHERN EAGLES
" 14. That no children, nor any other friends, be
taken as pledges for the good abearing of their parents,
and, if there be any such pledges now in the hands of
the English, they must presently be released.
" 15. That all Statutes made against the Preferment
of Irishmen, as well in their own country as abroad,
be presently recalled.
" 16. That the Queen nor her successors may in no
sort press an Irishman to serve them against his will.
" 17. That O'Neill, O'Donnell, the Earl of Desmond,
with all their partakers, may peaceably enjoy all lands
and privileges that did appertain to their predecessors
two hundred years past.
" 18. That all Irishmen, of what quality they be,
may freely travel in foreign countries for their better
experience, without making any of the Queen's officers
acquainted withal.
" 19. That all Irishmen may as freely travel and
traffic all merchandises in England as Englishmen,
paying the same rights and tributes as the English do.
" 20. That all Irishmen may freely traffic with all
merchandises that shall be thought fit by the Council
of State of Ireland for the profit of their Republic, with
foreigners or in foreign countries, and that no Irishman
shall be troubled for the passage of priests or other
religious men.
"21. That all Irishmen that will may learn and use
all occupations and arts whatsoever.
" 22. That all Irishmen may freely build ships of what
burden they will, furnishing the same with artillery and
all munitions at their pleasure."
These twenty-two articles represent what Cecil and
his colleagues made out of the parleys with O'Neill, and
they show clearly the strong position he was in, and
the bid he made for a final settlement of the Irish wars.
These conditions would have conceded to Elizabeth the
sovereignty, while depriving her of any power of keeping
England dominant in the country, and they would have
'75
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
pulled all the Irish aristocracy of all bloods at once to
Ireland's side. See especially articles 6, g to 14, 16,
17, and 22. Article n, by the way, is another nail in the
coffin of the oft-repeated myth that the English army
in Ireland was nearly all composed of Irishmen. At
this time Hugh O'Neill could easily have concluded a
peace upon terms which would have left himself and
his chief allies undisturbed, but would have left it in
England's power to interfere fatally in the country again
when they choose, but it is clear that he was not pre-
pared to agree to any peace which did not give a
guarantee of permanence, which was not based upon a
settlement which would put it out of England's power
to exploit Ireland, and he wasted very little time upon
negotiations. When he found that there was no possi-
bility of his terms being accepted he broke off the truce
and prepared for the next invasion. That, he knew,
would be no light thing. Elizabeth's fine army had
been, not alone beaten, but humiliated, and Elizabeth
knew that her enemies in Europe had begun to talk of
Hugh O'Neill and his generalship, and in her imagina-
tion she saw Spain and Ireland in hearty conjunction.
So she set about another army with all speed. And
Hugh, on his side, sent messages to Spain and Austria
for help, representing the war as a war against heresy,
and giving the same advice which Tone afterwards gave
France, to send a small force to Ulster, or a large force
to Munster. And, that done, he tried to pull all Ireland
together to meet the threatened shock, and made a
circuit of Munster and Leinster in the early part of 1600.
Ulster and Connacht, under his own eye and that of
O'Donnell, were safe. Ulster was with him to a man,
and in Connacht only the Earl of Clanrickarde held out
for the English. Leinster was fairly safe, with Owny
Mac Rory and Walter Tyrrell keeping their eagle eyes
upon Dublin and Kilkenny, but Munster was the weak
spot in the Confederacy, and he determined to go
through it and endeavour to put some unity of purpose
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
into it. In the previous years his ambassador to
Leinster and Munster had been his son Conn — (this
Conn, an illegitimate son, was one of his most trusted
and most efficient lieutenants, and played a prominent
part in the war. He is one of many, akin to Walter
Tyrrell and the Brown Geraldine, to be met with every-
where in these years, everywhere where there was work
to be done, and it was always effectively done, and
cheerfully done. The State Paper scribes delight to
call him a bastard. And some day, after all this spade-
work and laying bare of fundamentals has been driven
into the thick heads of our Universities, Conn O'Neill,
and Walter Tyrrell, and Walter Reagh, and their com-
rades, will come into their own) — but now, in the
interval between Essex and Mountjoy, he went himself
with his forces. This circuit, like unto the circuit of a
newly-elected Ard-Righ in the old days, was a remark-
able testimony to the way in which Hugh was regarded
through all Ireland as High King, practically. From
North to South of Ireland he went, slowly and at leisure,
and back again, and everywhere his march and his
reception were as those of a king. The English dared
not stir out of their fortified towns, and the Council in
Dublin, and Ormond in Kilkenny, and St. Leger in
Cork, saw his army within musket shot of them, and
let it pass unfought. The only martial operations he
carried on were against the O'Carrolls of Ely, who had
the previous year exterminated some of the MacMahons
of Oriel, O'Nei'lPs allies; and against David Barry, of
Barry More, the only notable Munster leader who held
out for Elizabeth. Barry remained defiant, and
answered O'Neill's letters to the effect that his title to
his lands was an English title, and that he would stand
for Elizabeth, and O'Neill contented himself with
wasting his territory and weakening his power to do
mischief. All the other notable chiefs confirmed their
alliance with the Northern Chiefs: the McCarthys
submitted to him a dispute concerning the leadership
N 177
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
of Desmond, \vhich he decided in favour of Finghin (or
Florence, as he is usually called) McCarthy ; James
Fitzthomas, the Sugan Earl of Desmond, renewed his
alliance with O'Neill, who had, as will be remembered,
made him an Earl. He had his camp at Inniscarra,
near Cork, and, as the Four Masters put it, "Thither
repaired the greater number of the English and Irish of
the two Provinces of Munster (except those in the great
towns) to submit and pay their homage to O'Neill ; and
such of them as were not able to come to him sent him
tokens of submission and presents, except Barry, before
mentioned, and the Lord of Musketry, and O'Sullivan
Beare. O'Neill obtained eighteen hostages of the
Chieftains of Munster at that camp; and he remained
twenty days examining the disputes and covenants of
the men of Munster, and reconciling them to each other
in their contentions." And having done all that was
possible to stiffen up the Munster chiefs for the expected
invasion, he marched back to Ulster unfought, eluding
Mountjoy, who had landed with his army in February
at Dublin, and leaving behind him 1,800 men under
Walter Tyrrell.
This period, the spring of 1600, marked the highest
point of the Irish wave in the war. Fynes Moryson
writes of it thus : " The mere Irish, puffed up with success
and blooded with happy encounters, did boldly keep
the field and proudly disdain the English forces. Great
part of the English-Irish were in open action of rebellion,
and most part of the rest temporized with the State,
openly professing obedience that they might live under
the protection thereof, but secretly relieving the rebels
and practising with them for their present and future
safeties. Among the English, the worthy generals of
this age, partly by this fatal war, partly by factions
at home, were so wasted as the best judgments could
hardly find out any man fit to command this army in
chief. The English common soldiers, by looseness of
body, the natural sickness of the country, by the
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
poverty of the war in which nothing was to be gained
but blows, and by the late defeats wherein great
numbers of them had perished, were altogether out of
heart. The colonels and commanders, considering the
army's weakeness, were somewhat dejected in mind ;
yea, the very Councillors of State were so diffident, as
some of them in late conference with Tyrone had
descended (I know not upon what warrant) to an abject
entreaty for a short cessation." But Hugh O'Neill
himself, the wisest and ablest head in Ireland, knew
well how precarious the position was while Dublin,
Kilkenny, Cork, Galvvay, and the seaport towns
generally remained in English hands, and he knew
that, without artillery, they could not be taken. That
it was which governed his action with regard to the
terms of peace he was willing to accept. Taking the
articles printed above as approximately representing
those he was willing to agree to, it will be seen that he
was willing to accept a peace which would guarantee
Ireland freedom, even under an English Viceroy, so
long as it ended the exploitation, which a peace on
those articles would have done. And the alternative,
the course to which he turned when peace was hopeless
— -the alternative was foreign aid. It is idle, and it is
shallow, to blame, as pseudo-historians have done,
Shane O'Neill and Hugh O'Neill for seeking foreign
aid, and for posing as champions of Catholicity at a
time when there was no practical religious oppression
in the country, and when there was no possibility of
binding Ireland together on a religious issue. It was
artillery they wanted, and siege guns especially, enough
to batter down the walls of Dublin and Kilkenny and
the other fortresses, and thus make Ireland safe ; and
the Catholic appeal was for the Pope, and Spain, and
Austria, and the Powers fighting a Catholic battle on
the continent. Matthew de Oviedo, who was at Dun-
gannon as envoy from the Pope and Spain, sent to find
out the truth about Ireland, wrote to King Philip in
179
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
June, confirming all O'Neill's previous letters, and
saying that " if a help of 6,000 men and some large
guns were sent them, they could take any city in
Ireland"; and O'Neill himself, writing to Philip, says:
" At present matters stand in so favourable a way in
this Kingdom that with some help and some large
guns to make breaches in the walls, this war would end
successfully, for we have an army in all the provinces
of Ireland, and when the succour reaches us, and its
arrival becomes known, our strength would be doubled;
whereas if the aid fails to come, or is delayed, our
forces must grow less and melt away, not having means
to subsist." That was exactly the position at anytime
between the i5th August, 1598, and the first moves of
Mountjoy in May or June 1600. Siege guns! For
eighteen months only a normal equipment of artillery
stood between Ireland and freedom.
180
CHAPTER XXV
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES.— MOUNTJOY, AND CAREW, AND
DOWCRA (1600-1)
In the beginning of 1600, Elizabeth sent over
Mountjoy as Viceroy, Carevv as President of Munster,
and Dowcra as Commander of Derry and the Ulster
garrisons, with a new army of 12,000 foot and 1,200
horse, and with a new policy, new, that is, as compared
with that of Essex, but more in keeping with the
general English policy. Essex and his 20,000 men
had passed as chaff before the wind in an ordinary trial
of strength by battle with the Irish, and, therefore, the
weapons of the trio included battle only as a final resort.
Their policy was a policy of (i) extermination, (2) burning
of crops, houses, and destruction of cattle, (3) detach-
ing from the Confederacy such of the Irish chiefs as
were amenable to soft talk, (4) promoting quarrels and
bogus claimants to various clanships, (5) assassination.
That is to say, the comparative honesty of Essex was
thrown overboard, and the standing basis of English
policy in Ireland was reverted to. Elizabeth's instruc-
tionsto Mountjoy were full, and exact, and characteristic.
She began by being pious, " And forasmuch as the two
pillars of kingly state are piety and justice, we do
recommend unto your special care to preserve the
true exercise of religion amongst our loving subjects ;
and though the time do not permit that you should
now intermeddle by any severity or violence in matters
of religion, until we have better established our power
there to countenance your actions in that kind, yet we
require you that, both in your own house and in our
181
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
armies, you forsee that no neglect be used in that
behalf." And Mountjoy and Carew played up bravely
to that key, and interlarded their correspondence
plentifully with pious references to the Deity, while
all the time they were murdering women and children,
and harmless beasts, Mountjoy trying to hire assassins
to murder Hugh O'Neill, and Carew trying to hire
them to murder the Munster leaders, " generally holding a
market for assassins," as Standish O'Grady puts it.
Elizabeth, however, having relieved her mind of her
anxiety about souls, went on to more practical subjects
and, in one pregnant sentence, laid the lines upon
which Mountjoy mainly acted in his holding of the
country — " It is plainly confessed that there is no
course to be taken but by plantation of garrisons in
the heart of the countries of the capital rebels " — a
course which was generally adopted both by Carew and
Mountjoy.
To all the "rebels," save Hugh O'Neill, Mountjoy
was instructed what terms to offer, but Hugh was to
be taken alive or dead without conditions. " Use all
means possible to cut him off as a reprobate to God,
and leave him to the force of our sword. . . . We would
have you make a great difference between the northern
rebels and the others of Munster and Leinster. Of
those of the north, we have not had much profit, and
therefore can be content you do therein for a beginning
order things, so in their compositions, as rather to seek
provision for continuing them in obedience and abate-
ment of their greatness, than to strain them to any
matter of profit . . . but for the rebels in Munster and
in other places, where our English subjects are seated
and planted, we require you there not to yield to any
conditions that may displant them, or bind us to give
away to traitors any matters of value, which of right
appertain to us ; for that were to reward traitors, and
not to forgive them." And she ended up with a special
command that " as we have lost the best part of our
182
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
possessions by the rebellion in Minister " an immediate
effort should be made to reduce that province. It was
Munster, therefore, the weakest of the provinces, which
had to bear the fiercest and most ruthless attack — the
attack of Carew.
Mountjoy got his campaign going at once, and sent
Dowcra by sea to Derry with over 4,000 men, Carew
to Munster with 3,000, while he himself with the
remainder feinted at O'Neill in order to distract atten-
tion from Dowcra. When Carew got to Munster he
saw quite enough to deter him from making any attempt
to risk a pitched battle with the combined chiefs, or
with MacCarthy Mor or the Earl of Desmond singly;
he found the whole province in a state of complete
revolt, and even some of the walled towns, garrisoned
though they were, trembling in the balance. And
so he struck hard and mercilessly at the smaller
men, leaving for the present the Earl of Desmond,
MacCarthy Mor, Pierce Lacy, and Dermot O'Connor
alone, none of whom had the insight to see his game
and attack him. Some of the chiefs, by means of letters
and promises, he detached from the Confederacy, and
broke at his leisure, others he came down on suddenly,
and broke at once ; MacCarthy Mor he succeeded in
inducing to proclaim himself neutral, to sit on the
fence; and gradually he recovered all the castles in
Waterford, Limerick, and Kerry. In these castles he
planted garrisons who wasted the surrounding country,
destroying crops, and cattle, and houses, killing women
and children, and in December 1600, he felt himself
strong enough to move against Desmond and Lacy.
He proclaimed a free pardon for Munster — on con-
ditions of promise of good behaviour, etc. — save for
James FitzThomas Desmond, John FitzThomas
Desmond, Thomas Fitzmaurice, eldest son to the
late traitorous Baron Lixnaw, Edmund FitzThomas
Fitzgerald, commonly called the Knight of the Valley,
and Pierce Lacy of the BrufT in Limerick " ; and when,
183
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
the next year, John FitzThomas and Pierce Lacy were
slain in battle, and James FitzThomas taken by
treachery, Carew could point once more to a Munster
which was apparently pacified and quite in the English
grip again. But it was a forced, sullen, pacification,
which he proceeded to make more secure by a multipli-
cation of garrisons.
In Leinster, Mountjoy had adopted a similar policy.
He struck hard at the O'Byrnes with all his strength,
and fought a number of battles with Owny Mac Rory
and Tyrrell; but when, in August 1600, Owny was
mortally wounded in a skirmish, the formidable aspect
of the Leinster Confederacy disappeared, and the
English were freed from urgent apprehension of all
save O'Neill and O'Donnell, and the indomitable Tyrrell
who was still in Leinster. Not that " rebellion," in a
disconnected and disorganized fashion, was not still
rife both in Leinster and in Munster, but that only in
Ulster and in Connacht, under O'Neill and O'Donnell,
was it formidable. The material was still there, but
Munster had not produced a leader, and the leader who
had been the life and soul of Leinster — Owny Mac
Rory — was slain. The Northern Eagles still held their
ground.
And well and bravely they rose to the occasion.
Dowcra's 4,000 sailed up Lough Foyle, landed at
Derry, and built three forts in the neighbourhood, while
Mountjoy drew O'Neill's attention South. O'Neill
burned Portmore and Armagh, and tried to draw
Mountjoy further North, but he would not be drawn,
and he turned back when he thought that Dowcra had
had time to make good his footing. Here is what the
Spanish Envoy wrote to King Philip at this time of the
situation: — " Yet such is the bravery of these two Earls,
and of their followers, that if they fought with equal
arms they would have no fear; but as they have neither
muskets nor artillery, they cannot drive them from the
forts which they are erecting each day within the
184
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
province, and as the war has lasted so long, they are so
exhausted and impoverished that they have not the
means of supporting the soldiers or of paying them,
and so every day we are afraid they will leave us. The
English are making great efforts to bring about a peace,
offering excellent terms. . . . To all this they reply
most honourably that they will hold out so long as they
have one soldier, or there remains a cow to eat. At
present they have got together a very good army, so
that O'Neill made the Viceroy retreat when he was
coming by land, and O'Donnell keeps those who came
by sea shut up in their fortresses." That was Oviedo's
impressions, and Hugh O'Neill, writing at the same
time, asks just for siege guns, guns to enable him to
batter down the walls of the forts.
Yet even without artillery, and without money, and
without a plethora of muskets, O'Neill and O'Donnell
held their own. Mountjoy made several expeditions to
the North, and succeeded in planting several forts on
the south side of O'Neill's lines, and O'Neill on his
part avoided a pitched battle, and contented himself
with keeping Mountjoy out. They had constant and
sometimes very heavy skirmishing along the line of the
fortifications, but nothing decisive. O'Neill, evidently,
waiting for the promised Spanish help. O'Donnell, on
his side, had to guard Connacht, and watch Dowcra.
He sat down before the newly-erected forts, smothered
all Dowcra's attempts at sallying forth to gain a grip
on the neighbourhood, and proceeded to draw a cordon;
so that soon Dowcra's provisions ran short, and his men
began to die from disease. " Now the winter began to
be fierce upon us," wrote Dowcra, " our men wasted
with continual labours, the island scattered with cabins
full of sick men, our biscuit all spent, our other provisions
of nothing but meal, butter, and a little wine, and that
by computation to hold out but six days longer . . .
our two forts, notwithstanding all the diligence we had
been able to use, far from the state of being defensible
185
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
. . . our horses were so weak and few that we
were not able to hold watch any farther out/' In these
straits he attempted to suborn Niall Garbh O'Donnell,
in command for Red Hugh, and succeeded. Niall
Garbh was a brave and capable leader, a cousin of Red
Hugh's, and married to his sister Nuala, and probably
the rightful chief by Feudal law. Dowcra worked
upon this and promised, in Elizabeth's name, to give
him Tyrconnell. The bait took, and Niall Garbh went
over to the enemy, took Lifford for the English, and
thence to Donegal, where he took and garrisoned the
Abbey. Red Hugh was then in Connacht, fighting—
and beating — Clanrickarde, who had to be constantly
watched, and he came back like a whirlwind. He
blockaded Lifford, and gradually swept the English and
Niall back towards the sea, getting Niall finally, in
desperate straits, besieged in Donegal Abbey, which he
blew up, Niall escaping to the castle of Donegal. This
also Red Hugh blockaded, notwithstanding the fire of
an English ship in the harbour; and this was the situa-
tion, that he was in a fair way to drive both Dowcra
and Niall into the sea when the news came in September
1601, of the Spanish landing at Kinsale — the most fatal
event in Irish history. All operations were immediately
suspended, and the theatre of war shipped from the
uttermost North to the uttermost South — from Donegal
to Kinsale.
186
CHAPTER XXVI
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— KINSALE (1601)
For more than two years Hugh O'Neill had wanted
but heavy artillery to drive the English out of Ireland,
and for more than two years Spanish aid had been
promised: " If you send a large army," said he, "send
it to Munster; but if a small one, send it to Ulster";
and Philip sent a small army, and sent it to Munster,
after Munster had been dragooned by Carew, most of
her castles and strong places garrisoned again by the
English, and her most trusted chiefs dead or prisoners.
In anticipation of a Spanish landing he had captured,
by treachery, the chiefs of greatest note, e.g., Florence
McCarthy Mor, and in Munster there was none to call
a rally when Don Juan put in at Kinsale. And yet
Carew had his doubts. He was just a bloody-minded
coward and butcher, and never felt safe : in his letters
to Elizabeth, in the months preceding the Spanish
landing, we find a continual wail for reinforcements
and money, and a continual reiteration that all Munster
will rise as one man if the Spaniards come. Even the
towns, Carew felt, were not safe, and this feeling of his
was justified when Kinsale, which was an English town,
received the Spaniards with open arms.
The Spanish force which landed at Kinsale on the 23rd
September, 1601, is variously numbered — O'Sullivan
Beare gives it as 2,500; Carew says 3,400; and modern
writers take it generally at 4,000.* It certainly was not
more than 4,000, and we may take it at that. The
command of the expedition had been offered to several
of Philip's generals, who had refused it unless an army
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
of betwen 8,000 and 10,000 men was sent, but Don
Juan, who was then in prison under charges of mis-
conduct in previous commands, took it on with 4,000,
and the 4,000 did not even bring any material, spare
arms, or artillery : an expedition, obviously, to twist
England's tail without any hope, in Philip's mind, of
doing her any real injury ; the only injury it did was to
us. Just then the war was at a critical point, and both
parties understood that : it was touch and go, and the
least thing might set the balance finally to one side.
Mountjoy's 13,000 were already almost spent, between
garrisons and skirmishings, for every trip he had taken
north he had had to fight O'Neill a guerilla fight once
he got to the Ulster borders. Dowcra and the remnants
of his 4,000 were hard pressed by O'Donnell, and on
the point of being overwhelmed ; all North Connacht
was behind O'Donnell, and only Clanrickarde and
Thomond held out for England ; Leinster was more or
less in arms, not strongly and vigorously and aggres-
sively, as under Owny Mac Rory, but sullenly and
smoulderingly, demanding constant wariness, with
Walter Tyrrell still holding himself over the heads of
the English like a bogey man ; and even dragooned
Munster, garrisoned and slashed, even it had an
atmosphere that made Carew troubled in his mind.
Elizabeth was even getting impatient at the lack of big
results, impatient at the constant call for reinforcements;
and so far every mile of territory had to be fought for.
Into this Ireland came the news of the Spanish
landing, and at once both parties concentrated upon
Kinsale. Mountjoy and Carew were afraid that unless
they went for the Spaniards at once the whole of the
Munster Irish would join them, and messengers were
sent all over the country gathering the English in,
Carew and Mountjoy, at the same time, marching post
haste to Kinsale with what men they had, so as to pre-
vent Don Juan moving into the interior. In this whole
crisis may.be observed, more clearly and more damnably
188
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
than in any other, the operations of what John Mitchel
ironically termed the " British Providence " ; for the
Spanish force landed in two divisions, the first under Don
Juan, at Kinsale, was only 3,400 men, and the second,
which did not land until some weeks later at Castle-
haven, was 700. Don Juan's force was too few to take
the offensive, and so he just held Kinsale, and sent
messengers to O'Neill and O'Donnell to come and join
him : and he made no effort to gather up the Irish of
that coast. According to Philip O'Sullivan Beare, he
refused the aid of Domhnall O'Sullivan Beare, with
1,000 men, and waited for O'Neill and O'Donnell ; and,
so, Mountjoy and Carew had uninterrupted liberty to
bring up their troops until O'Donnell came down like
a whirlwind, and Munster rose behind him.
News travelled slowly then, and it is not clear when
Don Juan's messengers reached O'Neill and
O'Donnell. They had told King Philp that if he
sent an army to Munster they would be unable to
help, and it would have to be strong enough to fight
its own way ; yet, after a hasty council, they
chivalrously staked all on this, summoned all their
confederates, and prepared to march south and fight
it out with Mountjoy. It was the middle of October
before Mountjoy and Carew began any kind of siege
business at Kinsale, and it was the middle of November
before their artillery was in place, and their lines made,
and the siege proper begun. We do not know for
certain what his forces were, but they were at least
12,000, for he was able to send 4,000 under Carew to
meet O'Donnell. O'Neill and O'Donnell could not,
straightaway, upon receiving Don Juan's letters, begin
a march south ; they had to summon up their reserves,
to leave sufficient behind to ensure that their own
territories would be held whatever happened, and
generally to secure a line of retreat. Red Hugh moved
first with 1,500 men, all that he could spare, leaving
Ruairi O'Donnell to look after Tirchonaill; eluded
189
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Carew and his 4,000 by a lightning mountain march
— thirty-two Irish miles with carriage in one day —
which Carew confessed to be the best march he had
ever heard of, and reached Kinsale on 23rd November.
Behind him Minister was up, and many castles and
strong places again in Irish hands ; and he promptly
sat down and besieged Mountjoy closely on the west,
awaiting O'Neill. A fortnight later O'Neill arrived with
4,000, camped at Belgooly, and besieged Mountjoy on
the north and east. And there he was shut in, in a
trap, to which there seemed to be no outlet. Munster
had risen, as Carew feared, all save McCarthy Reagh
and Cormac McCarthy of Muskerry, and all Mountjoy's
lines of communication were cut. The English fleet
held Kinsale harbour, but between that and Mountjoy
stood Kinsale town and the Spaniards, and if Don Juan
was between the fire of the fleet and of Mountjoy,
Mountjoy was between Don Juan and O'Neill. And so,
shut in in wet weather, short of provisions, huddled
together, his men began to die like sheep. He began
with an army, including 5,000 reinforcements, which
came from Barnstaple, and Ilfracombe, and Bristol,
of perhaps 15,000. On the 23rd November the State
Papers give his numbers as 10,000, and a few weeks
later it was down to 6,000, of whom, according to
Carew, not more than one quarter were wholly fit to
fight.
Thus far Hugh O'Neill had been managing the
campaign, and managing it well. He never fought a
battle when it could be avoided, and in this case he
saw clearly that Mountjoy must surrender in a very
short time. He kept enough of the Ulstermen before
Kinsale to ensure that the lines were tightly drawn,
and used the others in expeditions behind — commis-
sariat, or attacks upon castles, and so on. And he
would have been able to carry his plan to the end were
it not for Don Juan. Don Juan grew tired of the siege
— a siege in which the Spaniards fought well — and sent
190
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
urgent letters to O'Neill and O'Donnell, demanding
that they should attack Monntjoy. These letters
became so urgent that a special Council of War was
called, and O'Neill was overborne. " O'Donnell, how-
ever," say the Annals, " was oppressed at heart, and
ashamed to hear the complaint and distress of the
Spaniards without relieving them," and another
annalist, Lughaidh O'Clery, who wrote O'Donnell's
life, says that the two Hughs quarrelled about it.
But anyway, Hugh O'Neill was overborne, and it was
decided to attack Mountjoy on the night of the 24th
December, 1601.
The whole circumstances of the attack, and of the
resultant battle, are still mysterious. Carew asserts
that one of the Ulster chiefs — MacMahon — warned him
of the attack, but his testimony is uncorroborated, and
as his book, The Pacata, is full of lies about this siege,
it is not evidence enough. On the other hand, as Don
Juan was, according to the Irish plan, to sally forth at
the same time as the Irish attacked, as he never fired
a shot until long after the battle was over, and, as
Carew himself admits that letters of O'Neill's to Don
Juan were intercepted, it seems to me at least equally
probable that O'Neill's messenger to Don Juan was
captured, and thus the English were ready, and Don
Juan ignorant of the attack. And the circumstances
of the battle are as obscure as the circumstances under
which it was planned. The Irish army set out in three
divisions, first O'Neill, then O'Donnell, and finally
Tyrrell, with the men of Munster and Leinster ; they
had only a few miles to march to get to Mountjoy's
camp ; yet O'Neill only reached it to find it daylight,
Mountjoy ready, his own division spent and weary
after a night march, and O'Donnell and Tyrrell some-
where behind. On coming in sight of the enemy he
halted and formed up his men to await O'Donnell's
arrival, and, finding him not coming, decided to
postpone the attack, and gave the signal for retreat.
191
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Whereupon Monntjoy attacked with his cavalry, and
his first charge was beaten back, but the second, with
the whole weight of the English cavalry behind, it,
succeeded, and the Tireoghain men were broken, and
scattering confusion amongst theTirchonaill men, who
had just come up, they, too, were broken, and the
skirmish became a rout, Tyrrell, with his division and
with the Castlehaven Spaniards, covering the retreat
to Innishannon. Carew and all the English writers
claim about 2,000 Irish slain, but the Four Masters
say " very few " were slain, and Philip O'Sullivan Beare
says two hundred. Here is his account of the battle,
the most detailed we have, and somewhat different
from the general account. After describing O'Neill's
arrival opposite Mountjoy's camp in the early morning,
and his surprise at Don Juan's inaction, he says that
on the camp being reconnoitred it was found that lt it
was very strongly fortified with a rampart, a trench,
turrets, and engines. The soldiers were under arms,
the horses ready bridled. Even in point of numbers
they were superior to the Irish. . . . For this reason
O'Neill, putting off the engagement for another day by
advice of the leaders, ordered the troops to retreat.
When they had retreated about half a mile they met
O'Donnell, and at the very same moment the Viceroy's
cavalry was at hand. These crossed the river, which
was near, at a ford, O'Donnell, coming up with his
horse, beat them back through the same ford, and put
them to flight. The Viceroy's cavalry made another
attempt to recross the ford. O'Donnell, thinking they
could be easily overpowered between himself and the
ford, gradually retreated. While he was thus engaged,
a portion of his cavalry, either by accident or through
perfidy and treachery, turning back their horses and
thrusting themselves into his lines, forced the ranks of
his infantry asunder. The infantry, thrown thus into
disorder, betook themselves to flight. The columns of
O'Neill and O'Sullivan fled likewise, though the enemy
192
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
was not pressing on them, and their leaders were in
vain calling them back. . . . O'Neill and O'Donnell
were unable to bring them back again to the fight.'*
Out of all this, and out of Carew's account, the only
thing we can be certain of is this: that Hugh O'Neill
was outvoted in Council, and probably went to the
attack with a heavy heart ; possibly it was an attack
for the details of which he was not responsible ; that
it was a stormy night, and that in the two short miles
they had to go the " British Providence " sent the three
divisions astray ; that they came opposite Mountjoy's
camp at daylight, separated and in disorder (Carew
says that the charge was ordered because they were
perceived to be in some disorder) ; that they were
charged by the English cavalry before they could form
up properly; and, finally, that the army was seized
with panic, and collapsed.
It was the turning point in the war, the one thing
that was to send the balance on the wrong side, and it
was the only battle the Irish lost in the whole nine
years ! All the Irish authorities agree that the number
slain was small, but the moral effect was disastrous.
Shame took possession of the army and of its leaders ;
O'Donnell neither slept nor ate for three days and three
nights ; and finally, after another council, they decided
to return to Ulster, leaving Tyrrell behind to make
what headway he could against Mountjoy, and sending
Hugh O'Donnell to Spain to plead the Irish cause
personally with Philip. O'Donnell pleaded for areturn,
and a reblockade of Mountjoy, but this time it was he
who was outvoted.
The impatience of De Aguila, and the impulsive
chivalrousness of O'Donnell, who could not resist his
appeal for relief, had taken out of Hugh O'Neill's hands
the fruition of his long years' planning and fighting,
but he never complained. Back he went to Tireoghain,
to make a new army, and fight it out to a finish.
193
CHAPTER XXVII
THE GREAT FIGHT OF THE NORTHERN
EAGLES— THE LAST CAMPAIGN (1601-3)
" Immense and countless was the loss in that place,"
say the Annals, re Kinsale, " although the number slain
was trifling; for the prowess and valour, prosperity
and affluence, nobleness and chivalry, dignity and
renown, hospitality and generosity, bravery and pro-
tection, devotion and pure religion, of the Island, were
lost in this engagement." Let it be remembered again
that in the whole course of the war it was the only
battle the Irish lost; and that in the final campaign
between that and the 3oth March, 1603, they were
rather worn down by famine and decimated by the
constant warfare and the exhaustion of their reserves,
than actually beaten in battle. It is difficult to under-
stand the paralysis of national effort which followed
Kinsale, save that the fatally blundering result of the
operations there spread panic and shame everywhere.
After the battle the chiefs held a council at Innishannon,
and even then the position might have been retrieved.
Mountjoy had some 6,000 men, of whom not more than
4,000 at a liberal estimate, were fit ; Don Juan had
2,000 ; the allies had perhaps 4,000 or 5,000 ; and
the enemy was in the grip of fever. There was no
pursuit, and there was nothing to prevent the blockade
of the English being continued. That, the Annals tell
us, wa .'Red Hugh's counsel, to gather up their men,
turn back, and blockade Mountjoy again ; but this
time he was outvoted, and the decision come to was
for the chiefs to return to their own territories and
hold them, to leave Tyrrell behind in Munster with
194
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
O'Sullivan Beare in command, the pair to do the best
they could against Mountjoy, and to send O'Donnell
to Spain to King Philip to urge reinforcements;
Ruaidhri O'Donnell to command in Tirchonaill. And
so it was done. O'Donnell sailed for Spain, Tyrrell
remained behind, and the rest went back to Ulster and
Leinster. In ten days Hugh O'Neill was at Dun-
gannon looking after the defences of Tireoghan and
Ruaidhri O'Donnell reconnoitring Niall Garbh and
Dowcra in Tirchonaill.
Red Hugh reached Spain and saw King Philip, who
promised to send reinforcements, and sent urgent letters
to Don Juan, bidding him hold out until their arrival.
But Don Juan had already made terms with Mountjoy,
marched out of Kinsale with colours, etc., and was sent
back to Spain, delivering up to Mountjoy the castles of
the MacCarthys, and O'Driscolls, and O'Sullivans, which
they had given him to garrison — save Dunbuidhe, which
O'Sullivan managed to seize in time. And when Philip
learned of the surrender of Don Juan, he countermanded
the immediate preparations and waited. Red Hugh
stayed on, still pressing him for aid, but " the weapon
of the Saxon" found him, and he died on the loth Sep-
tember, poisoned by a spy of the coward Carew's, one
James Blake, dying, one may imagine, with the horror
•of Kinsale — lost by his impetuosity — over his soul.
One of Ireland's greatest and most faithful ; some day
a free Ireland will bring his ashes back to the country
he loved and died for.
Turn we now to affairs at home. And first let us
see what forces the English had. I have given details
from time to time taken altogether from English sources,
of their armies in Ireland, armies three and four times
as numerous as those with which superficial writers of
Irish history have credited them. Those who believe,
or assert, that England maintained no armies, or small
armies in Ireland, are liars or incompetents; either
they falsify facts, or they have never sought them.
195
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Under date April 1602, in the State Papers, there is a
list of the English forces in Ireland which comes out
at 16,100 foot and 1,350 horse — this after Kinsale, and
not including the forces of many Irish chiefs, who by
that time had made peace, and under the conditions
of peace were bound to act against those who still held
out. And Mountjoy, in sending this list and asking for
a reinforcement of 2,000, writes: — "And such Irish
companies which are now standing are those which
have been erected not by me, but by your Lordship's
orders, and I have discharged 3,092 men who were in
list when I entered upon the Government." The
16,100 foot were distributed as follows : — In Leinster,
5,900 ; in Munster, 4,400 ; with Dowcra, 3,000 ; at
Carrickfergus, 1,000; and in Connacht, 1,800; and
Mountjoy set about the subjection of the provinces at
once. In Leinster there was little difficulty. The
death of Owny MacRuaidhri O'More had staggered
Leinster, and now, with Walter Tyrrell also out of the
province, the other chiefs rapidly made peace. They
were all " pardoned," and re-granted their lands under
English tenure, with certain reservations for forts, etc.,
as Mountjoy held authority to deal leniently with any-
body except Hugh O'Neill. Elizabeth wanted him
dead, or absolutely at her mercy.
Munster and Connacht, and Ulster, however, still
made something of a fight, and in the three provinces
the same policy was adopted — the policy which
Mountjoy and Carew had begun when Mountjoy was
made Deputy. Famine, intrigue, and extermination
formed the policy. Everywhere the crops and houses
were burned ; chiefs who were wavering were offered
peace and invited to conferences ; and those who held
out were attacked on all sides, and no quarter shown
to men, women, or children. The defeat at Kinsale
and the dispersal of the Ulstermen broke up the
Munster Confederacy, despite TyrrelPs efforts, and
individual chiefs made their peace. Carew took
196
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
Dunboy Castle, after " the most obstinate siege recorded
in history," as he termed it, and butchered the garrison
•of one hundred and forty-three men — or the survivors
of it — who had held it against his 3,000 ; Sir Charles
Wilmot, another of them, coming across the Irish
hospital in the Kerry mountains, butchered the
wounded ; and so on. Domhnall O'Sullivan Beare,
Tyrrell, and MacCarthy Cairbre saw their forces
dwindle away as the weeks passed, with no hope of
reinforcement, until finally they dispersed altogether :
Tyrrell to Leinster, MacCarthy " on his keeping," and
O'Sullivan, with the remnants of his men, with four
hundred men and six hundred women and children, to
make his famous march to Leitrim. Every mile of the
way, from Berehaven to Leitrim, had to be fought—
for Elizabeth wanted him badly owing to some dis-
paraging remarks he had passed about her — but they
fought their way, with diminishing numbers, and out
of the 1,000 that started thirty-five entered the hospitable
doors of Brian O'Rorke of the battleaxes. Then there
was peace, Carevv's vulture peace, once more in
Munster.
South Connacht, under Thomond and Clanrickarde,
was safe for the English, and they moved north, and
gradually, when they found Ruardhi O'Donnell unable
to help them as Red Hugh had, the chiefs of north
Connacht made their peace also. There remained
only Ulster, and on Ulster all the English forces were
now bent. They made elaborate preparations, and,
under the shadow of them, the great confederacy of
O'Neill's at length broke up. Randall MacDonnell of
the Glens made his peace ; so did O'Cahan ; so did
MacSweeney and O'Doherty, and many minor chief-
tains. And there remained only O'Neill, O'Donnell,
Cuchonnacht Maguire, Brian O'Rorke, and Walter
Tyrrell. Niall Garbh and Dowcra had maintained
their footing in Tirchonaill, and against O'Donnell
the English moved first, attacking him from the
197
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Connacht side. But he beat two of their armies in
succession, one at the Curlews and one at Ballysodare,
and Mountjoy approached him for peace. With no
prospect of help, and learning of Hugh's death in Spain,
O'Donnell made his peace also, and agreed to hold
Tirchonaill on an English tenure. There remained
only O'Neill, and O'Rorke, and the irrepressible Tyrrell,
the latter wandering about Ireland, skirmishing here
and there, and trying to rekindle the flame.
And on Tireoghain all the forces were now bent.
North, southeast and west, Hugh O'Neill was assailed,
and strong castles were erected on all sides of
Tireoghain. These were well garrisoned, and the
garrisons preyed the country around regularly, burning
and destroying, and prevented either help or food
entering Tireoghain. With the break-up of his con-
federacy, and the losses of the long war, Hugh O'Neill
had no troops to make a regular fight against the
English, but with what he had he fought a guerilla war,
burned Dungannon, and withdrew into the fastnesses,
and defied all efforts of Mountjoy to bring him to his
knees. In the twelve months that followed Kinsale,
Mountjoy tried all he knew, bribery, force, cajolery r
but in vain. The clansmen of Tireoghain stood by
Hugh O'Neill staunchly to the last man, and spent
themselves for him so long as he held out. In one of
his letters to Elizabeth, Mountjoy bemoans thus :
" And it is most sure that never traitor knew better
how to keep his own head than this, nor any subjects
have a more dreadful awe to lay violent hands on their
sacred prince, than these people have to touch the
person of their O'Neals; and he, that hath as pestilent
a judgment as ever any had, to nourish and to spread
his own infection, hath the ancient swelling and desire
of liberty in a conquered nation to work upon." And
in another letter he writes to Cecil : " I pray you, sir,
believe me that I have omitted nothing, both by power
and policy, to ruin him, and utterly to cut him off;
198
THE NORTHERN EAGLES
and if by either I may procure his head before I have
engaged her royall word for his safety, I protest I will
do it ; and much more be ready to possess myself of
his person if, by only promise of life, or by any other
means whereby I shall not directly scandal the majesty
of public faith, I can procure him to put himself in my
power." But they could neither overwhelm him nor
cajole him, although that year there were 1,000
unburied corpses in Tireoghain and 3,000 dead of
famine, and so in the end Mountjoy reluctantly prayed
Elizabeth for authority to offer terms of peace, and
Elizabeth as reluctantly agreed ; and on the 3Oth
March, 1603, peace was made. The terms were,
O'Neill to be " Earl of Tyrone," to be re-granted all
Tireoghain, save the land around Mountjoy and Charle-
mont Forts, and the lands then held by Henry Og
O'Neill and Torlogh MacHenry : all the inhabitants
to have the free exercise of their religion ; and O'Neill
to agree to receive an English sheriff and hold the land
on feudal tenure, and so on, in return for which he had
" a full pardon." Ruaidhri O'Donnell was made Earl
of Tyrconnell, to the dismay of Niall Garbh, who paid
for his treachery later by being committed to the Tower
of London, where he died. Brian of the Battleaxes,
O'Rorke, and Walter Tyrrell, the last gallant pair,
followed O'Neill's example, and made peace also. And,
for the first time, English law entered Tireoghain and
Tirchonaill.
So ended the great National Confederacy formed by
Hugh O'Neill, a great and a worthy, and an all but
successful attempt to free Ireland. How nearly it
succeeded only those who have studied the period will
appreciate, but for a long time it was on the verge of
it. Had O'Neill any heavy artillery after the Yellow
Ford, every town in Ireland would have opened its
gates to him, and with acclamation. Those who talk
of the " loyalty " of the Irish towns know not of what
they talk. In Ireland, as elsewhere in the Middle
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Ages, the towns developed marked individualities, and
had the usual contempt for the countrymen, which
the countrymen returned. Each town was a little
Republic, and Galway, Limerick, Cork, and Waterford,
for instance, kept fleets and used them. But all their
trading relations, or the majority of them, were with
the Irish, and their blood connections were mostly Irish
also, and a clean throw of the dice against England
would have thrown them all into O'Neill's hands.
They were " loyal," forsooth, because they had to be,
being held by heavy garrisons. Even the State Papers,
giving the English side of the story, afford ample
evidence of the state of the towns.
In Galway and Limerick, when O'Neill was in the
ascendant, the townsmen rejoiced, and mocked at and
insulted the garrison ; Kinsale received the Spaniards
with acclamation ; and the despatches are full of
references to the " pestilent and proud townsmen."
Carew found no loyalty in the Munster towns, nothing
but sullenness and rebellion ; and time and again he
warned Cecil that they were all "disaffected," and that
the only hope of holding them was to put strong
garrisons into them. Ireland was then finding herself,
strengthening her national consciousness, townsmen
and countrymen finding out their oneness ; but the
odds, the lack of artillery and the British Providence,
prevailed. And down she went, to gather strength for
a fresh effort, to gird up her loins to fight a new
plantation, a new importation of garrisons.
200
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE EARL OF TYRONE (1603-1607)
We may dismiss at once as more or less fabulous the
detailed accounts we get from English sources of the
abjectness of the submission of Hugh O'Neill and
Ruaidhri O'Donnell. O'Donnell and O'Neill made
treaties of peace rather than submissions : and it is set
out in Mountjoy's own despatches that he had found it
impossible to compass O'Neill's destruction by force or
cunning, or to induce him to come to any conference
or to trust himself to the English, without a definite
treaty. O'Donnell, as we know, beat the two English
armies that were sent against him in the last campaign,
and the Annals definitely state that Mountjoy then sought
peace. We know from his own despatches that he
gave up as impossible the idea of removing O'Neill by
force of arms, and that he braved Elizabeth's wrath by
frankly telling her there was no chance of getting him,
and by recommending, as the only thing to be done, a
treaty with him. Elizabeth agreed reluctantly, and the
result was the Treaty of Mellifont. O'Neill and
O'Donnell went with Mountjoy to London, where they
were well received by James, and the articles were con-
firmed. They both agreed to hold their territories by
English tenure, and to renounce Irish tenure, to renounce
Irish titles, and to admit English sheriffs, judges, and
the rest ; but they were granted, by English law, the
territories they and their ancestors had held, and the
only apparent difference in Tireoghain and Tirchonaill
was to be the admission of English law, and the final
banishment of Irish law. O'Neill was given power to
exercise martial law in Tireoghain, all garrisons, save
201
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Charlemont and Mellifont, were to be withdrawn. And
O'Neill went back to see what he could make of it
as an English Earl.
It was a situation which made the citizens and law-
abiding folk gnash their teeth. Here they had been
fighting for ten years against " a pestilent traitor," only
to find him, not alone still in possession of the lands
they coveted, but apparently in high favour. " I have
lived," wrathfully wrote Sir John Harington, " to see
that damnable rebel, Tyrone, brought to England
honoured and well liked. Oh, what is there that does
not prove the inconstancy of wordly matters ! How
I did labour after that knave's destruction ! I adventured
perils by sea and land, was near starving, eat horse-
flesh in Munster, and all to quell that man, who now
smileth in peace at those who did hazard their lives to
destroy him ; and how doth Tyrone dare us, old com-
manders, with his presence and protection." And he
very quickly gave evidence that as Earl of Tyrone, even
as The O'Neill, he would rule in his own territories. He
hanged, without trial, two of Dowcra's men whom he
found plundering in Tireoghain ; he exacted cess from
O'Cahan ; he stoutly denied the exactions made upon
him in the name of the Church by Montgomery, Bishop
of Derry. And complaints made to Mountjoy fell on
deaf ears. Mountjoy had had a taste of O'Neill's quality,
and was unwilling to stir him up again. He refused to
interfere, and the intriguers bided their time for the
coming of a Lord Deputy who should be more zealous
and less scrupulous in trie cause of good government.
They got him later in Chichester, an enemy of O'Neill's.
O'Donnell also had been vigorous, too vigorous for a
man who is alleged to have been beaten to his knees
before the treaty. Niall Garbh had had himself pro-
claimed O'Donnell. and Ruaidhri, coming down on him
with the decision of Red Hugh, beat him and ended his
O'Donnellship. Niall also appealed to England, and
England decided against him. And so it looked as if
202
THE EARL OF TYRONE
there were going to be a miracle, in the shape of a pair
of loyal Earls in the North, and another miracle in an
English Government which would let them keep their
lands. There has been much nonsense written about
this particular point in Irish history, and historians
with flimsy knowledge of the period have written
rounded periods on the fair prospect which was opening
up for Ireland in the justice wrhich she was about to
receive from England on the one hand, and the deter-
mination of the erstwhile rebels to be loyal, on the
other. But the English were only resting on their oars
pending the next move in the game, as were the Irish.
Both parties had put out all their strength in a big
fight, which left them exhausted, and the treaty was,
like all similar treaties, a compromise. The mainspring
of English policy in Ireland — the subjection of the Irish
race, and the imposition upon it of a ruling and holding
garrison — was still there, and the impulses that moved
O'Neill and O'Donnell, the call of their nation, of their
civilization, the remembrance and the smell of burnt
crops and houses and bodies: these were still there.
There could have been no permanent truce. Hugh
O'Neill, Prince of Ulster, and Ruaidhri O'Donnell,
Prince of Tirchonaill, could never have lived their lives
out as Earls of an English civilization. The slow march
of Anglicization on the Irish nation had made a per-
ceptible advance, but the Irish people had still arms in
their hands, and the man with the gun never gives in.
He may make a treaty but he will not permanently
surrender. Those who in modern times have discredited
the Northern Eagles with the intention of giving up
the Nation and occupying the Province, are people who
come of several generations of disarmed folk: not alone
disarmed, but having no wish to be armed. And such-
like should not write of war and the things of war, and
the results of war and the justifications of war.
Mountjoy was resting, and England was resting ;
and O'Neill was resting, in the meantime rebuilding
203
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
Tireoghain as well as he could in the altered
circumstances.
In the four years during which he remained Earl of
Tyrone, O'Neill pursued the same policy which he had
pursued in his early manhood, when he was laying the
foundation of the Great Confederation ; he kept scrupu-
lously on the safe side, so far as open action was
-concerned, performed all his treaty obligations
carefully and faithfully, and gave the enemy no chance
to come down on him for a breach. Sir John Davys,
«ven, has grudgingly left testimony to the fact that
Tireoghain was the quietest and best governed part of
Ireland. But this has been too rashly taken as indi-
cating that O'Neill had accepted defeat and was
henceforth determined to be loyal, of which there is
no evidence, and strong inferential evidence to the
contrary. During the years in which he planned the
great insurrection he was also quiet and peaceable, a
loyal man and a trusted man, fighting, even, against
James Fitzmaurice and against Hugh Maguire. And
it was precisely then, when he was most carefully
giving no overt sign, that he was most dangerous. It
is inconceivable that, after his long life of plan and
effort, he could or would settle down to anything less
than the best he had hoped for, and the years after
Mellifont found him, I have no doubt, planning another
attempt: establishing friendly relations with other
chiefs, strengthening himself — that was his way, an
advance by inches. James had been faced, at his
accession, by that which shrewd Carew had feared and
foretold, a revolt of the Munster towns. Cork,
Limerick, Waterford, and Kilkenny shut their gates
against the English on hearing of Elizabeth's death,
and for a time things looked very shaky. But
Mountjoy marched straight on Cork, which stood a
siege and then surrendered, and made terms with the
others, and an incipient revolt of the towns was checked.
Had it come three years previously, it had delivered all
204
THE EARL OF TYRONE
Ireland to Hugh O'Neill. But it rather knocks on the
head the prevalent theories of the "Savage" school,
that the Irish towns were loyal to England at this
period. Coupled with that was another pregnant fact,
that one of the first proclamations of James was one
declaring that he had no intention of being tolerant
in matters of religion, and ordering all Jesuits and
seminary priests to quit the country forthwith. And
these indicated two things ; first, that Ireland was
being hammered by tribulation into oneness; and
second, that conformity to English land-law having
at last been secured, nominally at least, the next thing
attempted would be conformity to English religion.
And so, although there is no direct evidence, I have
no doubt whatever that Hugh O'Neill, at this juncture,,
was acting, not up to the character which some modern
historians will foist upon him, of a man playing for
his own hand, but rather acting up to the character
given him by the Four Masters — "A warlike, valorous,
predatory, enterprising Lord, in defending his religion
and his patrimony against his enemies." In a word,
that he was still, in heart and in deed, Prince of Ulster
and rebel unrepentant and unashamed, and, naturally,
" plotting."
Be that as it may, the experiment of an Earl of
Tyrone was rudely cut short. O'Neill was deluged
with law-suits, and plots and rumours of plots reached
the Privy Council. O'Neill, O'Donnell, O'Cahan,,
O'Hagan, Randall McDonnell, and pracically all the
northern chiefs, were said to be planning insurrection.
The irrepressible Walter Tyrrell, " the best man of
them after O'Neill," as Mountjoy termed him, was also
said to be of the company, and O'Neill and O'Donnell,
apprehensive of early arrest, came to the desperate
resolution of leaving Ireland. The attempt to live as
English Earls, whether made really or as the cover for
a gathering of strength for a new trial, proved too
much for them, and on the I4th September, 1607,
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THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
•O'Neill, O'Donnell, Maguire, and their families and
friends, left Lough Swilly and never saw Ireland again.
The Four Masters wrote of it : " Woe to the heart
that meditated ; woe to the mind that conceived ; woe
to the council that decided on the project of their
setting out on this voyage."
This was the only blunder O'Neill made in his whole
career. It removed out of Ireland the one man whom
the English feared, and the one man who could have,
at that juncture, pulled her together for another effort.
It deprived the mass of the people of the chief in whom
they put their greatest faith, and it left Ulster open to
the planters. Had the chiefs stuck on there would
have been no plantation of Ulster on the extensive scale
which followed their flight and the confiscation of their
lands, and the whole of subsequent Irish history would
have been altered. There would now be no " Ulster "
question apart from an Irish question. But even Hugh
O'Neill had not learned from his experience in the war
that no help was to be expected from the continent.
He expected to come back with an army and artillery
behind him, and deliver his people. But on the con-
tinent he got nothing but promises ; and the remainder
of his life was passed going from Court to Court,
thinking all the time of the day when his sword would
flash in his hand on Irish soil again. He died in 1616,
in his seventy-eighth year, one of the greatest of
Irishmen, as soldier or statesman.
The way was now clearing for the Plantation of
Ulster, and the Undertakers rejoiced.
206
CHAPTER XXIX
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER (1610)
Sir John Davies, who was Solicitor-General, Serjeant-
at-Law, Word-Compounder-in-Chief, and what not at
this period, has left us, in his Discoverie of the true causes
why Ireland has not been subdued, and in his various
reports and letters, not alone a typical example of the
omniscient Englishman, but a searching insight into
English policy and English methods, even from the
point of view of law. Writing about the flight of the
Earls, Sir John says : " We are glad to see the day
wherein the countenance and majesty of the law and
civil government hath banished Tyrone out of Ireland,
which the best army in Europe, and the expense of
two millions of sterling pounds, had not been able to
bring to pass." (Incidentally the reader should note
the phrase, "the best army in Europe." Allowing even
for exaggeration that phrase indicates clearly enough
that in this matter of armies the best that the English
could do was done : and it is another of the many nails
from English sources, with which to nail the lie so
commonly accepted that the English forces in Ireland
were only nominal.) John O'Donovan, commenting on
this naive and typical paragraph, interprets it as proof,
amounting almost to certainty, that it was a deliberate
English policy which flooded O'Neill, O'Donnell,
and Maguire with bogus lawsuits and bogus claims
after the Treaty of Mellifont, making their lives
hideous with constant attendance at law courts,
and thus inducing the flight. However that may
be, after the flight, law began to feed its full upon
the land, Commissions and Courts; Courts and Com-
missions ! One might easily write volumes upon them,
207
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
upon their stupendous building up, in bewildering
phraseology, of mythical claims and mythical forfeitures.
The King's title to the country of so and so, and the
falsity of O'Cahan's title to his country, or O'Reilly's
title to his. English law in Ireland has always meant
proving black white.
In the plantations which followed the Treaty of
Mellifont, the submission of an exhausted and dragooned
Ireland to English law everywhere, and the final catas-
trophe of the flight of the Earls, the Plantation of Ulster
holds the field. But this does not mean that there
were not other plantations. There were, and all over
Ireland: in Leinster, Munster, and Connacht, as well
as in Ulster. Under Davies and his fellows' legal
arguments and direction there were Commissions every-
where to inquire into defective titles, a Commission to
inquire into defective titles bsing, in law, just the same
as a packed jury. But the Ulster Plantation was easily
the most extensive, and the lands planted had hitherto
been virgin of English grip. James had, at his accession,
as we saw, promised that the Irish should remain
undisturbed in possession of their lands, but, as Noster
Johannes very fatuously points out, all this was con-
ditioned, as everything else, by law : and who is the
King, or what is the King's promise, that they should
override the law ? And so, after the first year of com-
parative tranquillity had been used to undermine the
clan leadership by promising the undertenants direct
grants of land from the Crown, after forts had been
erected, surveys of all lands made, and all strongholds,
etc., surveyed and noted, the Commissions were started,
and the Irish, bewildered and struck down by their
native respect for law, even a rotten law, could do
nothing. Law to them had always been a matter of
right and justice, of public weal and private probity,
and a law which was only a mask for oppression and
mercilessness was so strange to them that they did not
at first realize its devilishness.
208
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER
Sir John Davies, in his simplicity, will give us a more
convincing sidelight on law and Commissions than
anything that any modern commentator can write.
Before the Plantation of Ulster was finally promulgated
in detail there were several Commissions and surveys.
Here is an abstract from Davies' account of their method
of work: "... but the -rest of the spiritual lands,
which the Irish call termons, they were granted to
sundry servitors . . . but as well as these patentees as
the former did all fail in their performance of the con-
ditions whereupon their several estates depended, so as
there wanted nothing but an office to be found thereof
for the making void of all their patents. And therefore
as soon as the state of the possessions of this country
did appear unto my Lord Deputy to stand in such sort
as is before expressed, his Lordship forthwith com-
manded me to draw a Special Commission, directed
among others to the Chief Justice and myself, to inquire
as well of the breach of the conditions contained in the
grants before mentioned, as also of all escheated and
concealed lands in that country. Accordingly the
Commission was drawn and sealed in the haniper, in
the execution whereof we- impannelled as many of the
patentees themselves as appeared at that sessions to
inquire of the articles contained in the Commission; so
as they themselves found their own Letters Patent void,
some from non-payment of the King's Rent, and others
for not building of castles within the time prescribed.
Besides, they found divers of the original freeholders to
have been slain in the late rebellion, whereby eight or
nine ballibetaghs were escheated to the Crown, every
ballibetagh, as I said before, containing nine hundred
and fifty acres, or thereabouts; which office being
found, there rested in the possession of the Crown the
greatest part of that country. This being done, my
Lord Deputy entered into Council in what manner he
might best dispose and resettle the same again, accord-
ing to his instructions received out of England in that
P 209
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
behalf." And so on. The stamp of these Commissions
is Davies solemnly, as he sets it out above, drawing up
a Special Commission, directed to himself. Church
lands, or termon lands as they were called by the Irish,
were also confiscated, and used in the attempt to build
up in Ulster a Protestant Church.
Another instrument of " law and civil government "
was the " court of justice," humorously so called.
Here is Davies' unconsciously humorous account of the
administration of justice by the civilizers: "Our Grand
Jury was so well chosen as they found with good expe-
dition all the bills of indictment true; but on the other
side the juries that were impannelled for trial of the
prisoners did acquit them as fast, and found them not
guilty, which whether it was done for favour or fear it
is hard to judge. For the whole county consisting of
three or four names only, viz., M'Mahon, M'Rena,
M'Cabe, and O'Connaly, the chief was ever one of these
names, and of these names the jury did consist; so that
it was impossible to try him by his kinsmen, and there-
fore it was probable that the malefactors were acquitted
for favour. But, on the other part, we were induced to
think that fear might be the cause, forasmuch as the
poor people seemed very unwilling to be sworn of the
juries, alleging that, if they condemned any man, his
friends, in revenge, would rob or burn or kill them for
it, and that the like mischief had happened to divers
jurors since the last session holden there; such is the
barbarous malice and impiety of this people. Not-
withstanding, when we had punished one jury with
good round fines and imprisonment for acquitting some
prisoners contrary to direct and pregnant evidence,
another jury being impannelled for the trial of others
found two notorious malefactors guilty, whereof one
was a notable thief, and the other a receiver of thieves,
both which were presently executed, and their execution
struck some terror in the best men of the country."
Not unnaturally, oh Johannes: for your juries, methinks,
210
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER
were not wanted to try people, but to convict them ;
and so for the first time in their history, the people of
Ulster saw tyranny and injustice in the mask of law
and order; and thuswise came the blessing of English
civilization — as the " Savage " School are wont to term
them — to Ulster — honest jurymen fined and imprisoned.
One final extract and we may dismiss Davies. The
Irish in some of the counties had tried to meet law
with law, and briefed Pale lawyers to put their case
before the Commissions, which was done, special stress
being laid upon the earlier proclamation that they
would not be disturbed. "To this the King's Attorney
... for his Majesty's right, it shall appear," said he,
" that his Majesty may and ought to dispose of these
lands in such manner as he hath done, and is about to
do, in law, in conscience, and in honour.
" In law, whether the case is to be ruled by our law
of England which is in force, or by their own Brehon
Law, which is abolished and adjudged no law but a
lewd custom. It is our rule in our land that the King
is Lord Paramount of all the land in the Kingdom, and
that all his subjects hold their possessions of him,
mediate or immediate. It is another rule of our law
that where the tenant's estate doth fail and determine,
the lord of whom the land is holden may enter and
dispose thereof at his pleasure. Then those lands in
the County of Cavan which was O'Reilly's country,
are all holden of the King ; and because the captainship
or chiefry of O'Reilly is abolished by Act of Parliament
of Statute Second of Elizabeth, and also because two
of the chief lords elected by the country have been
lately slain in rebellion, which is an attainder in law,
these lands are holden immediately of his Majesty.
" If then the King's Majesty be immediate chief lord
of these lands, let us see what estates the tenants as
possessors have by the rules of the Common Law of
England. Either they have an Estate of Inheritance
or a lesser estate. A lesser estate they do not claim ;
211
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
or if they did, they ought to show the creation thereof,
which they cannot do. If they have an estate of
inheritance their lands ought to descend to a certain
heir; therefore they have no estate of inheritance."
And so on. This was the kind of jugglery, a mixture
of impudence and fatuity and words, by which Davies
proved to himself and to the conscience of law that no
Irishman had any right to a foot, even, of Irish soil.
And with many many thanks to him for his ingenious
exposure of his ways and his littleness, and those of his
nation, we may leave him. . He once wrote a
poem called " Nosce teipsum " — Know thyself! Oh,
Johannes, I am very glad you did not know yourself.
You might have gone without leaving behind you that
finished and unconscious betrayal of a consummately
servile and consummately scoundrelly mind. If Crom-
well had been forty years earlier, he might have
committed one good deed and lopped off your head
for the sake of your abject king-worship.
So it was, with lies and bribes and oppression, that
the Plantation -was prepared for, and the details were
finally worked out under the personal supervision of
James himself. It was provided, in order to prevent
any Undertaker becoming too powerful, that no lot
was to be more than 2,000 acres, the other lots being
1,500 acres and 1,000 acres. The regulations were so
framed as to ensure the planting in Ulster of commu-
nities everywhere, instead of merely military garrisons.
The planters were to build stone houses, to plant a
certain number of English or Scottish freeholders on
their lands, to plant all English customs, to employ no
Irish on their lands in any capacity, to erect and
support Protestant churches, to prohibit all Irish
habits and customs, and especially not to intermarry
with the Irish. The six counties which were planted
contained about 2,000,000 acres, and the portion
"escheated" was 511,000 acres — the good land, the
rest being bog, and mountain, and forest. Two-thirds
212
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER
of this was planted in equal numbers by English and
Scottish Undertakers, and the remaining third by
Servitors and Irish, Servitors being Englishmen and
Scotchmen who were already serving in Ireland, and
the Irish being approved, and not dangerous, Irishmen.
How this worked out may be seen from Sir Arthur
Chichester's complaint. Chichester was deep in the
Plantation Scheme, but he opposed it in two particu-
lars, in the limitation of the lots to 2,000 acres — this
was eliminated in his case, and he was granted the
whole of Innishowen — and in the lands granted to the
Irish. Chichester thought that a good proportion of
the forfeited lands should be regranted to the Irish,
and, after the Plantation details had been promulgated,
he complained that not more than one barony in each
county, and in some counties not even that much, had
been left them.
Such was the Plantation of Ulster. In some par-
ticulars it failed : for the Scotch intermarried with the
Irish almost from the beginning, and it was found
impossible rigidly to apply the rule that no Irish should
be employed on the lands: but it succeeded to the
extent that it planted its communities generally, and
for the first time in Irish history the framework of a
Protestant population began to appear there. Con-
temporary English opinion regarded this Plantation
as practically settling the Irish question, all save
Carew. Carew's Munster experiences seem to have
given him a lively sense of the Irish capacity: for he
had no delusions as to it being a final settlement, and
prophesied gloomily that the next war would be the
bloodiest of them all.
In the meantime the country was settling down to
a regrouping and revaluation of forces. Without
leaders for the first time in history the Ulster Irish,
meshed in law and only half conscious of it, left the
lands they had been born and bred in, where their
memories and homes were, and saw them in the
213
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
possession of strangers : they themselves pent in bogs
and mountains, watching the alien smoke coming from
the places they knew. The rest of Ireland, leaderless
also, went again about the business of daily life, patient
under the burthen. And the soul of Ireland began to
glimmer again through the chaos and the upset :
but before it blazed out to the radiance of the great
National resurrection of 1641, the greatest of all Irish
struggles, it had a few preliminary obstacles to clear.
It was invited into the spider's parlour, to wit — it was
given a form of Parliament, and it was given a religious
question. Hitherto there had been no Parliament
worthy of the name. Now the Parliament farce was
about to commence, and words to do duty for swords.
And for the first time the " Catholic Lord " appears
with his fictional loyalty and his subservious differentia-
tion of his own interests from those of the common
people. The weakening of the clan bond weakened
also the human bond and the national bond. Ireland
was to play for a while with phrases and arguments,
her mind still a bit clouded with the law of Sir John
Davies, and the justice of his Commissions and Assize
Courts, only to find again there was no law and no
justice outside the naked sword.
214
CHAPTER XXX
THE FIRST WEDGE DRIVEN HOME
The history of anglicization in Ireland is in its
essence the history of the driving of wedges into the
essential parts of the distinctive Irish civilization, and
Irish history since the coming of the English revolves
itself chiefly into the history of that struggle between
the two civilizations, one democratic, federal, with a
loosely-knit political system, and the other aristocratic,
feudal, highly organized and mechanical. The clan
system, which was responsible for the English obtain-
ing a footing in the first instance, was also responsible
for the astonishing power of resistance which Ireland
displayed. Feudal England accepted defeat, and her
people settled down to vassalship after one battle —
Hastings — but there was no conquering Ireland with-
out defeating in detail, and again and again, every clan
in Ireland. There was no central authority to be
paralysed by one defeat, or to be made terms with ;
the whole country had to be conquered in detail. This,
amongst other things, was what England had learned
in the centuries of warfare. Her early policy and
proceedings were so much groping in the dark : one
can see the fangs of her civilization reaching out this
way and that, seeking vulnerable spots, gradually
coming to definite conclusions as to what ought or
could be done. One can see her at first striking at
the more obvious things — political system and social
system, land and government— ~and then, grown more
subtle, strike at the more essential things— language
and general national atmosphere — until the present
century, when it reached its most devilish level. In
215
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
that history there are events which standout luminous,
marking changes, now a good change and now a bad
change — the short campaign of Bruce, for instance, or
the fatal treaty of Limerick. The flight of the Earls,
too, has its peculiar significance : it marked the subver-
sion of Ulster, and the subversion of the Irish political
system.
That Ulster remained unsubmerged so long after the
rest of Ireland was submerged in bits was due chiefly
to the fact that it was harder to get at. All Ireland
fought well against the English ; the O'Briens, and
MacCarthys, and O'Tooles, and O'Byrnes, as well as
the O'Neills, Maguires, and O'Donnells : and the clan
units of the Irish civilization gave a gallant account of
themselves, attacked in detail as they were and always
outnumbered. It was easy to get from Dublin, or
from Waterford, or Wexford, to the. south or west,
and easy to keep up the line of communications of an
invading army. But up north it was not so easy. And
so, Ulster was virgin of the English clutch long after
the rest of Ireland had grown familiar with it. That
was of incalculable advantage to Ireland in the struggle
she was waging, for it prevented any wholesale attempt
to depopulate or enslave her, such as was made after-
wards by Cromwell and William of Orange. So long
as one material portion of Ireland remained integrally
Irish, out of the reach of English law, and English arms,
and English bribes altogether, so long England had a
very insecure grip upon the country ; and it was Ulster,
ominous and formidable, which, in the years after the
Tudor policy began to get itself properly going, gave
the rest of Ireland time in which to recuperate. The
virile and independent north was a source of immense
moral, as well as material, support to the rest of Ireland;
and so long as it remained uncontaminated by the
English hand, so long England never felt free to carry
out the thorough policy which she always jrearned
towards. The Irish political system had been the first
216
THE FIRST WEDGE DRIVEN HOME
artery of Irish life to be attacked, and through Leinster
the English grip had crept out to Munster and to
Connacht. It had been reaching out to Ulster also,
and nearly got itself chipped off for its pains ; but now
it got its grip upon Ulster also, and for the first time
one distinctive and native Irish institution — the Irish
political system — was down under England's feet. For
the first time her governmental claw could seize upon
the externals of government in all Ireland. Ulster,
the unknown quantity, the land of the O'Neills, and
O'Donnells, and Maguires, who politely requested to
know the " eric " price of her sheriffs, who came even
up to the walls of Dublin in fierce foray, was in a fair
way to become merely a geographical expression. And
the eyes of the Irish, turned so long towards the north,
now knew not which way to turn.
Only a close and an understanding study of the four
centuries since the coming of the English will reveal
the intensity and the consistency of the struggle : how
it was not alone the Irish Provinces that had to be
beaten, but every county in them, and every parish in
every county. How the separate soul of Ireland nerved
and sustained her people, and wrought itself into the
most surprising places: and how Irish folk remained
Irish in heart and in civilization, even while being
politically English, Niall Garbh O'Donnell, for instance,
one year fighting under the English banner against
Red Hugh, and the next year proclaiming himself
"O'Donnell." The tonguge was Irish, and the rest
was only accidental. No political trappings could hide
the Irishman, and the English element in the Nation
was steadily assimilated, and steadily renewed by fresh
garrisons. That assimilation, through language and
social civilization, was one of the things to which
England had been waking up, and now, with a grip on
the governmental machine, she would have a free hand
to deal with it, and to attack the Irish Nation at its
root — language and education.
217
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
The significance of this point is not in the passing of
the clan system, as it is often stated. The clan system
did not pass, can hardly be said to have passed yet. It
was more than a system, it was a national instinct, the
fruit of a civilization the germ of which is in all dis-
tinctive Irish institutions. But after this the positions
were reversed, and the Irish political system found
itself at a disadvantage everywhere. In the early stages
the English settlements in the country were like islands
in an ocean. They were all surrounded by the Irish
system, which could have swallowed them all up had it
been conscious of their purport and their danger. For
a century, while Irish civilization was at the height of
its strength after the Bruce epoch, it only existed on
sufferance. Now the positions were to be reversed and
the English system, highly organized, merciless, and
mechanical, found itself as the ocean, swirling about
the fragments of the Irish system, which may now well
be likened to islands in an ocean. The first wedge had
been driven home into one of the Irish essentials, and
a political system, alien to the temper and character of
the people, bade fair to be imposed on them at the
sword's point. For four centuries England had been
buzzing about, had impeded the machine but been
unable to divert it ; now she was for the first time in a
position to divert it.
And that left her free for the attack on other and
more insidious lines. And herein let those who in our
times are disposed to be too scornful of politics and
politicians take heed. It was the weakening of the
Irish political machine which opened the way to angli-
cization, and it was the despised political arm of the
Nation which made the biggest fight. The submersion
of the Irish political system was the first definite step
into anglicization, as it must be the last step out of it.
The political system went first, then the land system,
then the language, and the attack on the two last was
rendered possible only by the success of the attack on
218
THE FIRST WEDGE DRIVEN HOME
the first. Every increase of English grip in Ireland
decreased, comparatively, the Irish power of resistance,
and while it took four centuries to break down the
political system, the land system lasted less than a cen-
tury thereafter, and the language not much more. So
long as the Irish political system stood upright, even
though in difficulties, so long anglicization halted at
that, but the break up of the political defence involved
also the eventual break up of all other defences. The
language alone proved unable to withstand the combined
attack of the influences which the command of the
political field gave to the anglicization policy. First
went the political system, then arms, then the land
system, and finally the language, and in the inverse
order they must come back.
We are passing now out of the period which so
many of the "Savage" school of Irish history have
characterized as uninteresting, nay, horrible, because
of the constant battles and forays and warlike expedi-
tions of all kinds. The hypercritics pretend to expect
that miracles should happen in Ireland, and that, in an
age when the ballot-box and the member of Parliament
were, thank God, undreamt of, a fierce struggle between
two civilizations should be carried on without war.
War there was, and plenty of it, just and necessary
war; but not nearly so much as one is led to believe.
And with it the arts of peace grew also, and there were
trade and commerce, wealth and learning, bards and
poets, in the Ireland of the Middle Ages. Had Ireland
been a weak and spiritless Nation, had her people had
no manhood, did they " lack gall to make oppression
bitter," may be they would have knelt down and kissed
their chains; but they rose up in "wrath and warlike
gear," as the Annals would put it, and they did battle
often and valiantly against the stranger. For centuries
there was no day whereon someone somewhere did not
lay a lance in rest for Ireland, and Irish blood has
reddened every inch of our soil. The constant record
219
THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NATION
of battles and expeditions is an honourable record, and
they who cannot, or will not, see in it the manifestation
of the Nation as it actually was — in eruption, gallant
and virile eruption — should not attempt to write history.
History is an interpretation and a justification, rather
than a splenetic criticism.
220
NOTE TO CHAPTER III
The political institution which calls itself the " Church of Ireland "
has, at times, claimed to be the National Church of Ireland on the
allegation that the Irish Church was independent of Rome until
Henry II held the Synod of Cashel. It may be as well, therefore, to
state that the unity of the Irish Church with that of Rome, for which
many Irish ecclesiastics had worked in the preceding centuries, took
place at the Synod of Kells in 1152. It is, of course, perfectly true to
say that the autonomy of the Irish Church disappeared after it
accepted Henry II, but that is a different matter.
NOTE TO CHAPTER XI
The relations between Shane O'Neill and the Countess of Argyle
which, though arousing no contemporary indignation, have aroused
some modern indignation, are possibly not so abnormal as has generally
been surmised. In his notes to the " MacDonnells of Antrim," the
Reverend G. Hill refers to the custom, which then prevailed in Scotland,
of handfasting, by which a marriage could be dissolved by the parties
after seven years, and states that this lady had probably been married
to the third Earl of Argyle, and the marriage dissolved after seven
years. It would appear from a letter in the State Papers that a
marriage ceremony between Shane and the Countess was celebrated
after the death of Shane's wife, and that the lady's father was present
at it. Calvagh O'Donnell was then alive, but the lady may possibly
have claimed power to dissolve her marriage under the Scottish cus-
tom. It is. at any rate, extremely unlikely that any priest would have
celebrated a blasphemous marriage, and the whole question still awaits
investigation.
221
JOHN MITCHEL : An Appreciation
With some Account of Young Ireland. By
P. S. O'HEGARTY. Cloth, 2S. 6d. net.
.... Should be read both for its interest as history, and for its
extreme expression of a point of view. — Daily News and Leader.
.... A thoughtful and interesting Appreciation of Mitchel's
policy and actions.— The Outlook.
This book is a well written enthusiastic account of John Mitchel.
— New Statesman.
This warm Appreciation by Mr. P. S. O'Hegarty of "John
Mitchel " and his work should appeal to many readers, so opportune
and appropriate now that 1916 has passed into history. He has
evidently devoted much careful research, study and keen judgment
in his task, and quotes copiously from Mitchel's United Irishman,
bringing to light many things that were hitherto neglected or
forgotten . — Irish Independent.
Mr. O'Hegarty's study of Mitchel is more than an Appreciation.
It is a fiery panegyric of " the greatest Irishman of the nineteenth
century, Ireland's greatest political genius, and her greatest literary
figure as well." . . . The relations between Mitchel and his col-
leagues are clearly traced and well documented, and in irrecon-
cilable invective Mr. O'Hegarty shows himself an apt disciple of
his master and hero. — Spectator.
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